


Girlfriend, You've Been Booked!

by HashtagPomegranate



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Angst, BAMF Darcy Lewis, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Complicated Relationships, Explicit Language, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Hacker Darcy Lewis, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Team Bonding, Team as Family, poor college student
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-26
Updated: 2019-06-11
Packaged: 2019-07-02 16:23:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 32
Words: 97,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15800238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HashtagPomegranate/pseuds/HashtagPomegranate
Summary: Post-college, Darcy Lewis is struggling.  Lots of debt and a degree that doesn't seem to be particularly helpful in the industry she wants to be in doesn't give her too many options.  So she signs on for an escort service.  She's not the typical woman on the site and forgets about it until she gets the email "Girlfriend, You've Been Booked!"  She almost doesn't open it, but low-and-behold she does.  With friendship, and new introductions, and fights, her life changes like she couldn't imagine.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm going to admit. I started writing this over a year and a half ago and as I type this it sits at about 115,000 words. That being said, that total hasn't changed in probably the last year? I'm hoping that posting this gives me more of a reason to go back and finally finish the thing. I'm going to aim for updates every week or two (starting 8/26/18), but wanted to give fair warning that I can't promise an end. 
> 
> I'll update relationships as the story progresses, I just didn't want to give everything away at the beginning of the story. I'm rereading parts of it tonight and I'm thoroughly enjoying it, and I hope that you will too! 
> 
> Enjoy

They met at a bad time for Darcy.  She had finished up her internship with Jane (finally official after the clusterfuck that was London) and she had packed up and finished her degree at Culver.  The problem was that she then graduated with a ton of debt, NDA’s about the only interesting things in her life, and a degree in political science.  All of which wasn’t particularly helpful in a post-recession economy where only the best and the brightest made it into the political science field with an actual paying job. 

Darcy knew she was bright and she knew that people liked her, but it didn’t change the fact that she didn’t have quite what anyone was looking for.  After all, working for free on various political campaigns might be good experience but it didn’t exactly pay to keep a person in poptarts and coffee.

What she did have was the, aforementioned, mountain of debt, a good knowledge of computers (and some friends from a misspent youth), a shitty apartment in a corner of Washington, DC that she didn’t like having to walk to late in the night or early in the morning (or ever, really), and a job at Starbucks near the Capitol. 

But DC was expensive and even her long hours making coffee for uptight people in suits couldn’t quite cover her rent, school loan payments, health care, food and the occasional treat to literally anything else. 

In other words, she desperately needed a new job, or at least a side job.  Something with weird hours that she could fit in between shifts.  She looked into tutoring, all that took was a few meetings with college students at GWU and American University to realize that wouldn’t be her cup of tea.  It wasn’t that there was an issue with the students, they seemed decent and smart.  But so many of them had the life she had always dreamed of with two parents that loved each other and helped pay for their kids college education. 

It wasn’t even that she was bitter.  Mostly a form of nostalgia that hurt her deep in her chest.  It wasn’t worth the measly money they would pay her to hold onto that feeling of sadness.

Most of the other jobs she had considered had the same problem.  They wanted more time than she could afford to take.  With all the hours she was putting in at the Starbucks she was sure they were going to make her a manager and she didn’t want to risk missing out on that for another low paying job.

However, she did find a service that would provide arm candy for men who needed dates.  It was made clear on the website that sex was off the table (which Darcy took with a “wink wink” meaning that if the ‘arm-candy’ was willing they could work it out with their date, technically keeping it legal).  All it took was one look at her bank account and her upcoming schedule and Darcy signed the fuck up.

 

Her ‘persona’ had been up on the website for a matter of weeks before her first hit.  Honestly, she had almost forgotten she had signed up for the website in the first place.  After a number of double shifts and her sad attempts at cooking on a budget, she didn’t have the time to dwell on her apparent unwanted status. 

She wasn’t tiny.  She had curves aplenty and a stomach that couldn’t be considered flat.  With her form, she had realized how to dress herself when she wanted attention, and how to dress herself when she didn’t.  To be fair, most of the time she didn’t want the attention and was happy to dress in her slouchy but comfortable sweater dresses and plaid (anything to hide the girls).  Luckily she had a few pictures from college: a few from normal nights going out and one from the night where she and Jane had decided to dress up for stargazing.  That picture was her favorite.  She hadn’t even realized that Erik was taking it.  If you looked from the right angle she almost looked like a pinup girl from the 40’s.  The black dress was tighter up top than she normally went for, but was cheap enough in the secondhand shop that she couldn’t say no, and something about the red belt and polka dots just screamed out at her.  Plus, the way the stars shone on her face while she leaned back on an extended arm?  At time Darcy almost didn’t recognize herself in it.

But she wasn’t what was in; a quick browse through the website showed that the vast majority of the ‘girlfriends’ were basically models.  All of them had perfect hair and a body fact percentage that would make the vast majority of the population’s eyes pop out of their heads.  They were gorgeous.  And if a guy was gonna shell out decent money to get a girl on his arm, most guys would probably go for that.

All of which is why at the point where Darcy got an email saying “Girlfriend, You’ve Been Booked!!!” she almost deleted it without opening it.  Clearly it was spam. 

At the last moment she opened the email to see a quick message.  “Normally I would want to meet you first but I have a friend that’s throwing a gala really last minute and desperately need someone so that my friends will finally stop trying to set me up.  Would you be available Saturday night at 8pm?  Do you still have the polka dot dress in the picture?”

She considered deleting the email, if only due to the short timeline, but she couldn’t help but to think of the sizable student loan payment she had coming up the next month.

It was enough to get her to hit reply.  “Yes, I still have the polka dot dress.  I can do 8 pm this Saturday.  Would you prefer to meet a bit beforehand to talk over our cover story?  I assume you don’t want to tell everyone that I’m a call girl after all.  Is the standard rate offered over the site okay with you?”

The basic contract of using the website was that the owner took a cut, about 25%, of the seemingly ridiculous $75.00 an hour.  Then again Darcy wasn’t complaining about getting paid way more an hour than she made at her actual work…  If she managed to get real money in her bank account she could go back to looking for a better job.

After clicking send she immediately shut her computer and went to treat herself to a $4 bottle of wine that she had grabbed in Trader Joes.  It was the kind of night where she wanted to treat herself.  Because she couldn’t afford to actually treat herself, getting pretty damn tipsy was going to have to do.

 

Tuesday, after an incredibly long day of dealing with a  few too many people looking at her like she deserved to be treated like crap for not getting them their coffee the minute it was ordered, she was dreading opening her computer. 

Setting up this date was almost as bad as setting up a blind date.  She had always done her best meeting new people in spontaneous ways.  When she knew she was meeting someone new it always led to thinking about what was going to happen, and then overthinking. It was simplest to say that her personality got turned to 110% and that rarely ended well. 

But there, waiting for her, was a reply.  “Of course, the standard rate should be perfectly fine.  A strategic planning meeting before the offensive sounds like a good idea.  May I take you to dinner?  Meet at The Obeslisk in Dupont at 6?”

Darcy did a quick google search for the restaurant and gulped at the prices.  She didn’t want to say no to the guy who would hopefully allow her to buy food, and not just ramen, for the next month.  At the same time, she would have been much happier with a simple burger than the ‘roast suckling pig’ that appeared on the menu. 

She gritted her teeth and replied with a peppy.  “Of course.  That sounds wonderful.  I will see you at 6pm.”  She just had to hope that he intended to pick up the check because at a fixed price, that meal would be almost an entire day of work.

 

Meanwhile, she had to go on about her life like nothing new was happening.  Pulled a couple of shifts at work.  Looking at the sad state of her bank account.  Kept up a text chat with Jane, current topics: how much they both missed Thor’s abs, if Jane’s research had come of anything, if Darcy’s job search had come of anything, how much they missed their lab in the desert, and cute kittens.   Turning down a mutual friends question about clubbing.  Two problems: that shit is expensive, the girl wanted to go Saturday night and Darcy already had plans that she didn’t want to confess to.

And then Saturday night arrived.  Darcy put on the polka dot dress which flared around her hips and dropped to just below her knees, with a pair of sensible heels and the bright red lipstick she wore as an armor.  Nobody questioned women in red lipstick, they would eat anyone who did alive.  It was a known fact.

The overly long metro ride gave her plenty of time to stew but she ended up outside the restaurant with five minutes to spare.  She stood outside, looking at the fancy white stone building, waiting for her date. 

“Looks pretty intimidating doesn’t it?” Said the blonde in a black suit standing next to her.  His face sharing the same slightly disbelieving look as Darcy’s own.

“Yeah.  I looked at the prices online and almost swallowed my tongue.”  She went back up to staring at the building, feeling dread start as a ball in her chest working its way to her fingers.

“It’s good to know I’m not the only one who can be shocked by how expensive things are nowadays.”

“I kind of wish that I had suggested to my date that we go somewhere else, but it was his suggestion and I didn’t want to look pushy.”  She glanced back at him smiling.

“Oh thank goodness.  A friend of mine recommended the place and I didn’t think to check what kind of restaurant it was before asking you.”

Her jaw dropped as she looked closer.  He wasn’t just a blonde man, she was standing next to the newly resurrected Captain America.  A Captain America who was apparently her date for tonight.  He grinned sheepishly at her reaction.

“Sorry about not sending a picture, I tried to find a few women before you but they all thought I was ‘catfishing’ them?”  He said, the quotes clear around the word, furrowing his eyebrows.

“No shit they thought you were catfishing them.  Nobody expects that Steve Rogers would need help getting a date.”

His shoulders dropped though he tried to keep up eye contact.  “You know who I am.”  It wasn’t a question but a serious statement.

“Please don’t take this the wrong way, but you don’t get out much do you?  You and the Avengers are still plastered on the news constantly.  I’m pretty sure the only people who wouldn’t recognize your famous mug are dead, blind, or born in a decade without cable news.”

His hand rubbed his face, a seemingly unconscious gesture. 

To placate him she added, “To be fair, that might not be completely true.  I was a political science major in college and one of my professors had a hard-o…. I mean, was a bit in love with you.  There was an entire semester where I saw your face almost every day.” 

He seemed to relax over that, which in turn made Darcy relax. 

“Great, and now that I know you’re my date for the evening,”  she wound her arm through his, “and that we both think this place is too fancy,” she waved her hand at the building as they slowly walked away, “why don’t we go to that pizza place over there to have our ‘strategic planning meeting before the offensive.’”

He chuckled a little, “Pizza sounds perfect, and I knew I shouldn’t have said that right after I sent it.  I’ve never been great with girls.”

“Not a problem, Steve.  It was charming.”

 

They were tucked away into a corner of Alberto’s, eating their slices of thin crust pizza (“you know this isn’t as good as Brookyn’s pizza back in the…”  “Is any pizza even gonna come close?”  “…no”  “then let us who can’t time travel enjoy our pizza”) and planning their story.

In the end they (Darcy) decided they should steal the plot of so many rom-coms and have met in a bookstore.  Steve was old fashioned and didn’t like to order books on the internet and Darcy knew the college student trick of studying in a bookstore because sometimes it was the only quiet space you could find.  They went to the café attached to the bookstore afterwards and ordered an overpriced appetizer (it’s still DC, pretty much everything is overpriced) and barely ate any of it after talking for hours.

This was only the agreed upon story after Darcy veto’d running in the park (with this upper body I don’t think anyone would believe I’ve ever run a mile in my life Steven) and Steve veto’d meeting as a contestant/judge in a wet t-shirt contest (Darcy even if you were the judge, I still don’t think anyone would believe I would participate in a contest like that).

Just as Steve was eating the last of his crust Darcy asked the question she’d been dying to ask since she realized who she was contracted with.  “So… why did you need to hire a date?  Don’t let it go to your head,” she joked, “but you’re an attractive guy.  Smart, if you look at your battle tactics, and you’re Captain America.  I would have thought women would be lining up.”

From the way he hunched it was clear she had stepped on another landmine.  “You don’t have to answer.  That was a super personal question.”  She backtracked.

“It’s hard to find someone with shared experience…” he mumbled.  He looked up at her, eyes wide.  “I think it’s easy for people to forget that I lost everyone I’ve ever known.  It’s a bit hard to be willing to open up to anyone after that.”

“You’re talking to me?”  Darcy offered.

He shrugged, “I’m paying for your attention, I guess I’m kind of treating you like a therapist.” He chuckled a little, “I had a buddy who would have gotten a kick out of this whole situation.”

Darcy smiled sadly, the use of the past tense, and his history in general, made it clear that the person wasn’t around anymore.  She didn’t want to leave the atmosphere so sad before they had to go to a party and pretend to be a couple. 

“Well, luckily I can be a pretty good listener. But also, I can talk to a brick wall if need be so if anyone starts bugging you tonight just give me a signal and I’ll talk to them until their eyes cross.  Speaking of we should probably go.  We’re already crossing the border from fashionably late to just plain late as it is.”

“Man, I was hoping you wouldn’t notice.  This is the kind of event where I have to dodge Senators that want to shake my hand and their wives who... want something else.”  He paused, not wanting to be rude or imply anything untoward. 

“Well lover boy,” she intoned, “tonight I’ll be your guard dog.  Bring on the competition.”

 

The party went surprisingly well.  Darcy’s knowledge of political science, and claim that she was a student completing her grad course online made her fairly popular with a small contingent of the Senators, not so much with their wives.  However, any time she was getting too many angry looks Steve would casually break in ‘begging’ to get in a dance.  Darcy did the same for him, any time he was starting to get a glazed look or someone was getting a little too touchy Darcy would swoop in with a  drink in hand to talk at them until they made an excuse to talk to someone else. 

All in all Darcy hadn’t had such a stress free evening in a long time.  Steve didn’t seem like he hated the time either.  By the end of the evening his shoulders had lost the tightness he had carried since they met, and he was gesticulating more in conversation with the few like minded people he had found. 

Still, around midnight he begged off claiming that Darcy had a big test the upcoming Monday that she would need to study for the next day; that he didn’t want to throw off her rhythm.  Darcy nodded along with his explanation and took one last look around the atrium with the soft lighting and windows that captured a view of the sky above.  It wasn’t exactly a look she would normally get so she savored the moment before grabbing Steve’s hand and leading him out.

Steve waved down a cab and ushered her in it.  “Thank you so much for tonight.  I’m hoping this goes through the grapevine back to my friends so they stop trying to set me up with women.”

“Happy to help you there Steve.”

He smiled and turned to the front of the cab, “Can you take us to…”  He looked back at Darcy, “What’s your address?”

She fidgeted, “You can just drop me off at the metro.”

His brow furrowed, “It’s late, I’d prefer for just take you home.”

Darcy steeled herself with a deep breath, “Its not pretty Steve.”

“All the more reason for me to make sure you get there safe.”

She sighed, of course Captain America would make sure his date got home safe.  She gave her address to the taxi driver and saw the double take.  It probably didn’t make sense that a man in a nice suit and a girl in a pretty dress would want to go to such a crappy neighborhood late at night.

The rest of the ride was pretty quiet.  Darcy was a bit embarrassed for Steve to see where she lived.  She couldn’t know why he was quiet but didn’t want to break the silence.

They pulled up outside of her apartment building and all Darcy could see were the cracks in the foundation, the overgrown garden and the complete lack of functioning streetlights.

“Well,” she reached for the door, “it’s been a blast.  Let me know if you ever need a beard again.”  His hand rested on her arm. 

“This is where you live?”  His eyes scanned the street, pausing on what he thought could be people hanging just around the corner.  Like Darcy his eyes took in the lack of lighting and the lack of care given to the building.  He turned to the driver, “do you mind waiting for a moment while I walk the lady to her apartment?”  The hesitation that greeted him made him break out his Captain voice.  “Sir, you will wait for the ten minutes I need.  Feel free to drive around the block, but you will pick me up in ten minutes.”

The man nodded his assent and let them leave before starting the car.  It was the kind of neighborhood where if you left your car idle for too long someone might start to take parts off of it. 

With trepidation Darcy let Steve follow her up the front steps, through the door that didn’t require a key or a code to get through, up three flights of grimy stairs to the door of her tiny, crappy, shoebox of an apartment.  She drew the line at letting him see the state of her apartment.  She had given up trying to keep it clean once it had become clear that her roommates were happy to let her play apartment Mom.  A month of being the only one vacuuming, washing dishes and wiping down the countertops was enough.  Her room still got the same attention it always would (growing up in the Foster system made her aware that a person may not have much but could at least take care of what they had) but she only did the bare necessity outside of that. 

Before she could say anything Steve was talking, “Look, I know that I make my payment through the website but I also know that you lose part of that, so…” he pulled out his wallet and started counting out some bills.  Of course he still carried around paper money. “Please take this.  You did a wonderful job tonight and…”

She took a step back, dismayed. “I don’t want your pity.”  Eye flickered down to the bills neatly folded in his hand.  Mind battled with heart; she didn’t want a handout but a little bit of extra money could go a long way.

“Please.  You really helped me out tonight, I might want you to join me on another night like tonight, and I…” his voice dropped, “I know what it’s like.”

Darcy’s mind flashed to that history class.  Single mother, grew up poor, couldn’t afford heat in the wintertime which didn’t do his various illnesses any favors.

“Okay.” Hesitantly, she reached out to take the money.  “But don’t expect this will get you any sexual favors.”  She joked weakly.

His face went bright red, “Of, of course not.  Has anyone…”

“Fuck, no, it was a joke Steve.”

“Oh.  Well, good night Darcy.  And thank you for your help.”

“Thank you Steve.  Get home safe.”  Though really he had nothing to worry about.  He probably had a cushy apartment and even if he didn’t nobody would mess with a guy his size.    She smiled one last time and then unlocked her door and tried to make it through without him being able to see the brunt of the pigsty. 

The apartment was as dirty as ever.  The couch that was old as balls and looked like it should be a home to a lovely rodent family was still covered in dirty clothes and empty pizza boxes.  Lights were still turned off, meaning that Leslie couldn’t be home, and the oven wasn’t on which meant that Jonny couldn’t be home.  There was a brief window of quiet, she knew, before her roommates would come home and throw the entire place into chaos. 

She went and unlocked her room; locked only because she had found Leslie in there going through her stuff once, and that was more than enough, and threw her purse on the bed.  Returning to the kitchen she opened the refrigerator, hoping the wine from earlier in the week would still be there, but no.  Sighing, she shut the door and went back to her room.  Once she locked herself back in; Jonny may have liked to watch people as they slept, she fell back on her crappy craigslist futon and groaned.  Way to piss off Captain America, who had paid her to play a girlfriend to keep him from getting accosted.  It was obvious she had offended him, and she knew, just knew, that there was no way he would want to see her again.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy assumes life is going to go back to normal after the first date with Steve. But that's not quite the case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has read this; I had no idea that this story would be so well accepted! It's been about a week and I wanted to go ahead and give you a little bit more of this story. I loved hearing from all of you and hope that you continue to enjoy this.

First thing Sunday morning Darcy went to deposit the handful of cash Steve had given her.  Once it, and the rest of her payment, was safely in her bank account she tried desperately to forget the night before.  It wasn’t that she wanted to forget everything.  She had met a national hero, figuratively wined and dined them, met more famous people than she ever had before, had charmed some of those famous people, and made a pretty penny to boot.

Except. Except it was unlikely to happen again.  If she kept thinking about how Steve looked in his suit, or the beautiful view, or even just laughing over cover stories it would make everything else so much harder. 

So she let the money ‘sit’ in her bank account (at least until her next rent payment, student loan payment, or grocery trip started to eat into it) and went on with her life.  After a week or two full of work and sitting in public libraries to kill time without killing her wallet, it was almost like the date had never happened.  She didn’t get any more pings on the website and a part of her was okay with that.  She had lucked out that Steve was such a good guy but didn’t really like her odds as to who else would show up.

She was sitting at a computer in the library, hers had broken down a few months before and she didn’t have the capital to get it up and running again, looking at the tutoring ads again.  The situation was starting to get a little bit desperate and Darcy didn’t want to get to the point of eating Ramen every night like she had with Jane.  That much sodium wasn’t good for anyone.

Then her email pinged.  She flinched and then scrambled to hit mute on the computer.  Some old person had clearly turned up the sound to compensate for their hearing and hadn’t bothered to put it back down.  There weren’t that many other people in the library so she wasn’t sure why she was so flustered.  Mostly that at this point most of the emails she got were promotions for things, or facebook notifications, or even something from linkedin.  Except, for all of those, she had futzed with the code so that she wouldn’t get pinged. 

Cautiously she went over to gmail.  Sitting in her inbox was another email from Steve. 

“Sorry for taking so long to contact you again.  It’s been a crazy couple of weeks at work.  I have another function that I’m going to need to go to in three weeks.  I hope that was enough of a warning this time.” She could almost hear him pausing trying to figure out the next sentence because, “If you need a new dress, let me know and I have a friend who can take you shopping.  She knows how to dress for a party.”

Yup, there was the pity.  Captain America assumed she only had one nice dress.  To be fair, he wasn’t exactly far off.  She had three nice dresses: the polka dot dress, a blue dress that she had scrimped and saved for so that she would match her friends at graduation, and an lbd that had seen a college campus, two internships, and a couple of moves. 

“Hey Steve, I hope everything went well and that nothing ended up full of bullet holes.  Thank your friend for the offer but I think I should be covered this time.  What time and where do you want to meet?”

She pressed send and x’ed out of the page of college students looking for tutors.  If she had another date with Steve coming up that could help keep her going for at least another month. 

It took two days before she could get back to a computer.  She refused to set an earlier alarm for any day that she worked.  If she was called in at 2pm she would wake up at noon and not a minute earlier.  Unfortunately that meant that when she worked the closing shift all the libraries were closed before she was.  So, early Thursday afternoon she logged back on to see yet another email.

“No bullet holes this time, we were at a conference. Can I pick you up at 6 pm at your apartment?  I was thinking we could try a new pizza place this time?”

Ah, the white knight.  He saw the shithole that she lived in and didn’t want to risk her in a pretty dress. She would have been tempted to push the issue.  She and her taser were perfectly capable of getting around her neighborhood.  At least, they were if anyone asked.  But it was starting to get into winter where the sun dipped below the horizon before most people ended their work day.  And at 6 pm her street did start to get really dark.

“Just so you know, I’m not going to let you pick me up every time.  I’m a purely modern girl.  I believe in using my own brains and metro card to meet up with people.  However, I will let you win this time.  I’ll see you at 6 pm.”

 

It was 5:30 and Darcy was rushing. The douchebag who worked the shift after her hadn’t gotten to work until over an hour after she was supposed to leave.  When she got home she smelled of bad coffee and had to deal with Leslie to boot.  “Have you paid rent yet?”

“Of course.”  Darcy pushed past her to get to her bedroom, “I paid on the 25th, like always.”  She shut the door and tucked her bag underneath a pile of clothes in the closet.  After the first incident she didn’t trust Leslie, even for the length of a shower. 

“Well… we’re short.” 

Darcy grabbed a towel and started towards the bathroom.  “Have you talked to Jonny?”

“He moved out.”  Darcy stopped dead. 

“What, when did that happen?”  She looked around.  It wasn’t like there was less detritus scattered around the apartment.

“Like a week ago.  He and his girlfriend decided to live in their car.”

Darcy put her face in her hands for a moment.  Fuck, fuck fuck fuck.  “Did you put in any extra to cover him?”

Leslie looked taken aback.  “Are we going to have to cover him?  That asshole.”

Finally, something they agreed on.  Darcy shook her head in disbelief.  “Just this month, can you split it?”

“Fine.” 

“I’ll start looking for a new roommate.”  Darcy offered, knowing it would be unlikely that she could find anyone decent who would be willing to live in a place like this.  Though maybe she could at least find someone a little bit cleaner.  But she looked at the clock and cursed lightly.  At this point she could dry shampoo her hair at the most to be even relatively on time.

After taking the quickest shower of her life, and spraying her hair with more dry shampoo than she was truly comfortable with she escaped back to her bedroom.  The list was basically endless: Spanx, dress, hair (and of course she couldn’t get the curls to stick), and makeup (why did her second eye never look as good as the first).  She was just putting the final touches on her lipstick (bright red, always good to go for a classic look) when she heard a knock on the apartment door. 

Groaning to herself, she grabbed a decent look purse and her jacket before trying to intercept Leslie.  The problem was she still needed to lock the door, and that wasted precious seconds.

“I think you have the wrong apartment.”  She heard Leslie say.  Coming up behind her she saw Steve looking as amazing as he did before.

“No, he doesn’t.  Hi Steve.” 

“Hello Darcy, you look wonderful.”

She blushed slightly, not immune to the compliment.  “Thank you, lets get going, don’t want to be late. See ya Leslie, we can talk more about the rent when I get back.” With that she basically hustled Steve out of the building and into the taxi. 

“Are you having a rent issue?”  Darcy let her head flop back against the headrest.

“We’re on a date and you want to talk about my roommate issues?  Really?”  She lifted her head and pinned him with a sarcastic glare.

“I’m interested?” 

She scoffed, “Sure.  And I like tax law.”

“Hey, tax law can be incredibly interesting once you get to the meat of it.” 

She stared at his serious expression with wide eyes and a nose crinkled in disgust.   It was almost a full 30 seconds before he cracked a grin. 

“You’re such an asshole.”  She lightly smacked his arm, his very toned arm.  “I actually believed you for a minute there.  It’s like you were straight out of a John Grisham novel.  The one where the tax law firm is actually a front for the mob.”  When there was no response to that she looked at him.  “John Grisham?  He writes fiction about lawyers being heroes?” 

He awkwardly shrugged.  “Most of my literature is a little older than that… or histories.  Work has me reading a lot of history.  Trying to catch up to current events, at least the ones that are important for right now.”

The taxi stopped in front of the same pizza place as before.  “Ah, can’t go wrong with a classic.”  She grinned at him.  “But also, what do they have you reading?”

“A little bit of everything.  Right now I think the focus is on the middle east, I think they’re trying to prepare me for working with Tony Stark on a more regular basis.  I think they hope I can convince him to get back to the weapons industry.”

“Oh Steve.  There’s so much pop culture you need to understand.  I think you’re going to need to keep a list.”

“Oh?  And what are your suggestions?”

She grinned wickedly.  “That’s a dangerous question to ask a political science major who minored in history and has a passing affection for anything that ends up on the internet.”  She smiled before realizing what she had said.  She snorted at herself, luckily her internet comment was made to someone who probably didn’t understand… and she looked over to see him bright red and choking back laughter.  “Did someone tell you what the internet is mostly used for?”  She asked with a grimace on her face.

“Tony may have thought it would be funny to get me tickets to see Avenue Q.”

The mental image of Steve tucked into a theater seat gradually understanding that the puppets on stage did not mean it was a kids show had Darcy fighting back some laughter of her own.  “Well, at least you have Tony Stark to get you started.  I’ll get a list ready for you next time; I’m thinking you need a little bit of classic tv and maybe some history that SHIELD would overlook as ‘unimportant.’” She did the finger quotes and everything. 

Steve set down his pizza, “What was,”  He copied the gesture, “this?”

Of course.  Why would he know that.  “They’re finger quotes.  It tends to mean someone is being sarcastic.  I’m assuming the version of history you’re getting is focused on certain things but might overlook, say, the moon landing.”

He nodded slightly.  “Yeah, someone told me that it happened.  I didn’t really believe them until I saw Tony and his suit.  Once you see that it’s a lot easier to believe that someone made it to the moon.”

They finished their pizza, Darcy grilling him on the scant pop culture he was aware of and mentally taking notes. 

The party was pretty similar to the last one in that everyone there seemed pretty classy and a number were stuck up.  She kept to the same script though she kept a little closer to Steve over the course of an evening, mostly due to the fact that with the people he didn’t like he would pull an ‘aw shucks’ routine.  The routine involved things like him using finger quotes to emphasize the wrong words and then turning to her, “did I do that right, honey?”  By the end of the evening the shocked looks had her practicing her poker face and trying not to bust a seam laughing. 

Yet again, around midnight he excused the both of them and hailed a cab.  Sitting in the ratty backseat of a cab and she said, “give me your phone.”  He hesitated for a second.  “Look, my computer crapped out a couple of months ago.  This way I don’t have to worry about not getting a message from you until a few days after its sent.”

He handed her his phone and she typed in her number before sending herself a text.  Once her phone buzzed three times she handed his phone back.  “If you have any questions about pop culture, just send me a text.  Off the clock even,” she laughed.  “It’ll be my treat.  After all you did get dinner.”

“That dinner was so expensive, don’t you think I deserve a little bit more?”  There was a glimmer in his eye. 

She smacked his arm again, “Okay, last time when I made the joke about you getting a little more bang for your buck I thought I had scared you off.  Yet here you are.”

“You treat me like a person.  You’d be surprised how rare that is.”  He smiled again, like he hadn’t said something heartbreaking.  That was the thing about Steve, is that once he started talking it was easy to forget his past, but then he would say something that brought all that back to the surface.

“It’s surprising how easy it is to treat a person as a person.” She suggested, not quite knowing what else to say.  Luckily, the cab pulled up in front of her building.  “I assume you’re going to play gentleman again, and walk me to my door.”

“It’s my pleasure.”  He smiled, turning to the antsy driver he used his Captain voice, “Son.  I’ll be back in ten minutes.  I’m just going to walk this lovely woman up to her door, then we can leave.” 

The man nodded and gripped his steering wheel just a little bit tighter.

Just like last time, at the door Steve handed her a little extra money.  Yet again, she tried to decline until he begged.  “The housing I live in is paid for by other people, I have so many meetings that I rarely have to buy my own food, and I don’t like the excess.  Please, you’re one of the only people I know who doesn’t think of me purely as something pretty to keep around, or a super soldier.”

And how could she refuse after that.  “You’re going to give a girl a complex, you know that?”

“Everyone deserves to be treated right.  Even just for a night.  I’ll see you at the next dance.” 

She smiled and watching him go down the stairs to the probably terrified cab driver before sticking the money in her purse and getting into her apartment.

Surprisingly Leslie was waiting up for her.  “That guy was really attractive.” 

She shrugged noncommittally.  “Family friend.” 

“Well, if he ever needs another ‘friend’ let him know I’m available, will you?”

“Sure thing, Leslie.”  Darcy went and locked herself in her room, letting herself remember every moment of the night.

 

Darcy was lucky enough that finding a new roommate wasn’t nearly as bad as she thought it would be.  The guy was still a little bit skeevy, but nothing was perfect.  He had an actual job, and yes he started at her boobs a little too long, but as long as he paid rent and didn’t know how to pick locks she would be okay.

And in that way, life went on.  She and Steve texted with some regularity.  Sometimes it was just a question about something he needed to look up, sometimes there were funny cat pictures being shared, and occasionally they made plans for another date.  The dates seemed to fall every two or three weeks.  It was enough money that Darcy was able to drop one of her shifts at Starbucks to give her a little more free time and grab the occasional drink after work with a coworker or two.

When Steve picked her up for their third date (yes she caved.  The metro took FOREVER sometimes) he pulled out a moleskin that he had started writing down references people made that he didn’t understand.  Darcy had to fight the urge to clap her hands, but excited listed off a few things she knew SHIELD would overlook.

The party after that was an actual dance.  Surprisingly, dancing wasn’t something that Steve picked up easily.  On the battlefield he was light on his feet and a quick thinker, which Darcy knew having found the footage in some legally dubious places.  He kept looking at his feet, which would then trip and tangle.  To distract him Darcy started asking questions, easy questions.

“Steve, have you ever played Call of Duty?”

His head popped up, no longer looking at his feet.  “What?”

“It’s a war game.  I can’t decide if you would love or hate it.”

“I’d probably hate it.  War is necessary in certain cases but shouldn’t be glorified and trivialized.”  Like in the King’s Speech, once he wasn’t paying attention to himself suddenly his feet were following her backseat lead. 

She nodded, “other than Tony tricking you into Avenue Q, have you seen anything on Broadway?”

“To be honest, I didn’t stay in New York for all that long after the New York disaster.  I did take a bit of a road trip: saw Mount Rushmore, and the Grand Canyon, even spent a couple of days roughing it in Yellowstone.”  His eyes were fixed on some point over her head and his features had softened.  Darcy waited until his focus was back on her before carrying on.

“Have you seen _A League of Their Own_?” He shook his head, “It’s a movie about a women’s baseball league during World War II.  It might hit a little close to home but I promise it’s worth it.  I’ll lend it to you when you drop me off tonight.”

“I used to love the movie _It’s a Wonderful Life_.  People didn’t really enjoy it, but I always thought it had a lot of heart.”

“Steve, that movie gets shown on TV every year at Christmas now.  It’s universally loved.”

A smile dawned on his face.  “That’s so good to hear.  I actually met Jimmy Stewart once.  We shot a promotion for the USAAF.  Recruiting men to the air force.  He seemed like a good guy.  I’m glad it sounds like he got the recognition he deserved.”

“That’s for sure.”  Darcy nudged him into twirling her around, “he’s one of the biggest stars from right after the War.”

They passed the rest of the night like that, just chatting.  It gave Darcy a better idea of what Steve might like to learn about, and Steve a better idea about what was important to Darcy.


	3. So Many Emotions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enter Natasha, stage right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey All, this is a day or so late, sorry. I was up in New York for the weekend and didn't have a computer. I was traveling light. Don't worry, the updates are still going to be relatively regular. Next one should be next Sunday. 
> 
> Enjoy!

The fourth date was coming up and Darcy had to cave on another point.  She texted Steve, ‘you mentioned a friend who was good at dress shopping?  I might need a little help.”

‘Of course.  I’ll give her your number.’ Was the reply.  It arrived only a few minutes after she had sent it in the first place. But that was Steve.  It either took a day and a half to get an answer or no time at all.

Without waiting for Steve’s mystery friend to text she dropped her phone on the couch and went back to reading a book about the moon landing.  After she had suggested it to Steve it seemed like a good idea to read up on the history herself. 

Half an hour later she wished that she had looked at her phone. 

There was a knock on the door, which in her neighborhood was rarely a good thing.  The doors in her apartment didn’t feature a peephole so she made sure the chain was set and slowly opened the door.

On the other side was a beautiful, and recognizable, red head.

“Holy shit, are you here to kill me?”  Darcy asked the Black Widow. 

Natasha rolled her eyes, “I told Steve to let you know I was coming over.  Are you gonna let me in?”

Quickly shutting the door and fumbling with the chain Darcy let Natasha in.  Natasha stepped into the apartment, eyes narrowed, taking in the ratty furniture and Darcy running into her bedroom to check her phone.  There was a text from Steve ‘She’s decided a text isn’t good enough.  She’s on her way.  Sorry I couldn’t give you more of a heads up.’

Natasha peered into Darcy’s room after her.  “Well it’s nice to know that your personal taste isn’t quite so…” she paused, clearly looking for a word that wouldn’t offend, “disgusting.”  Or maybe she was just trying to find a word.

Darcy’s mouth dropped open.  There was a split second of debating the level of sass she wanted to give vs the risk of disembowlment before words spilled out of her mouth.  “Wow. Rude.”  She bit her tongue to stop the rest of the diatribe.

A single raised eyebrow was the only response she got. 

Deep breath, just take a deep breath.  After facing down evil elves and evil princes of other realms Darcy could handle herself.  Though her hand was inching towards where she kept her taser… Just In Case.

“Are you here to insult me?  Or are we going shopping?”

“Why not both.”  The look in Natasha’s promised danger.

Natasha’s eyes lied.  They hadn’t gone to some fancy boutique, or a secret Russian store that you needed a code word to get into, or even a fancy dress shop.  They had gone to H&M.  Weaving through the store Natasha honed in on the section with the dresses and Darcy numbly followed. 

Natasha started flicking through the clothes, pulling a sleeve out to check the color before wrinkling her nose and letting it drop. 

“Humor me for a minute,”  Darcy started as Natasha pulled out a dress and held it next to her before shaking her head and putting it back.  “what the fuck are we doing in H&M if I have a fancy party to go to later?”

“Know your target,”  Natasha weaved towards a different rack of dresses.  “You look your best when you’re comfortable.  If I took you to a ridiculously fancy store you might feel put upon.”  She flicked through another couple of dresses, pulled a sleeve, “what size are you?”

“Somewhere between an 8 and a 10… and are you saying I’m cheap.”

“I’m saying Steve is paying for this,”  Natasha draped two different dresses over her arm, “and if we went to a store where anything was too expensive I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to actually get you to buy anything on his dime.”  She held up one more dress and nodded before handing the three dresses over.  “You try these on.  I’ll be back in a moment.”

Darcy took the dresses, a little too floored to argue about anything and headed towards the fitting room.  Pulling the first dress on, she started to call for Natasha, except a spy probably uses an alibi in public.  She peeked through the curtain to see an empty hallway.  “Natasha” she stage whispered. 

“What?” came a voice from the stall next to hers. 

“What am I supposed to call you?”  She asked in normal volume. 

The other curtain opened and the spy stepped out wearing some strange ruffled jumper.  “Natasha?”

“You don’t have a super secret alibi that you use in public?”

A smile finally cracked on her face.  “No.  Just Natasha works fine.”

“Now that we have that figured out, what is that monstrosity you’re wearing?”

Natasha looked in the mirror and turned.  “It was so ugly on the hanger that I didn’t think it could be any worse on a person.”  Looking at Darcy through the mirror she said, “clearly I was wrong. But, I’m not the focus of this am I.” 

Natasha turned her critical eye on Darcy’s dress, made her turn around and asked to see the next one.  That happened for the other dresses as well.

“I like the two lace dresses.” Natasha stated.

“I think the shorter one is probably better.” 

Natasha shrugged.  “You get dressed, I’ll meet you at the counter.” 

Darcy followed the instructions, dropping off the two long dresses in the returns pile and carrying the short dress to the counter where Natasha was waiting… with a bag.  “Did you already buy the dress?”

“Dresses, and yes. Hang that up and we can grab a drink.”

Darcy felt like ripping her hair out.  This wasn’t the way things happened, this wasn’t the way people acted.  If she was going to get a dress she was damn well going to buy it herself. 

“Think of it this way.” Natasha said, eyes slightly narrowed.  “Do you want to start something here?”

Darcy looked around and saw the glances that were already coming her way.  It would be easier if they could find someplace a little noisy and away from prying eyes.

“Fine.  But I’m not dropping this.”

“I didn’t think you would,” Natasha mumbled under her breath as Darcy hung up the spare dress.

15 minutes later they had found some tiny café and had been seated, at Darcy’s request, in a booth near the back.  “Okay, what the fuck is going on.”

“I used Steve’s money to buy you some dresses.” 

Darcy didn’t know where to start.  “I’m going to table the ‘you buying me things using Steve’s money’ for now, but why did you get more than one dress?”

Natasha swirled the straw in her water.  “You’re going to keep seeing him aren’t you?  Eventually you would need more than four things to wear to fancy functions.   This way you’ll have a better rotation.  Also the backless dress is going to knock his socks off.”

“Ooookay, I can’t argue that that is a very good point.  But I don’t want Steve, or you for that matter, buying me things.  I can take care of myself.”

“He’s already paying for you to go places with him.  Why is a dress any different?”

Like she hadn’t just exposed Darcy’s biggest most embarrassing secret, Natasha waved over the waitress and ordered a pitcher of sangria, took a glance at Darcy, and asked that it be red.

“You know about that?”  Darcy asked when the waitress left.

“I’m a good spy.”

Darcy buried her head in her arms on the table, not wanting to face the world.  “Does he know that you know?”

“I said, I’m a good spy.”  The tone of voice had changed from nonchalant to a little bit irritated.  Apparently Darcy had hit a nerve.

“Really, that’s the thing about this situation that pisses you off?  That I questioned your spy abilities?”

It was the slightest shrug Darcy had ever seen, mixed with a tilt of the head and a quirk of the lips, “mostly it was a stupid question.”

Pushing herself back to sitting straight Darcy tried to sort things out.  “So you know I’m a ‘rent-a-girlfriend,’ and your friend is paying me pretty well for it.  But instead of killing me you’re treating me to sangria and bought me dresses on your friends dime…  Did I get hit in the head?”

“I looked you up in my free time,”  ‘spies have free time?’ Darcy muttered grumpily, causing Natasha to glare.  “and it seems like you aren’t trying to pull anything.  Would you like me to revise my opinion? I’ve been wrong before.”

“Nope, nope.  All good here.”

The sangria arrived and Natasha immediately started pouring glasses. 

“Still, what are you intentions with Steve?”

Darcy let her head drop back down to her arms, both hoping that Natasha wouldn’t hear any of it and that she wouldn’t have to repeat herself.  “Well, my stupid degree doesn’t help in the real world and my stupid job doesn’t even cover rent in my stupid apartment.  Steve’s a nice guy, and kind of a looker, but I’m happy just being his beard.”  She lifted up her head. “It’s those moments where everything is going well and you’re having a great time and he says something and all you can think is ‘oh shit, everyone he knows is dead.’  It started out as just a way to help cover some of my groceries and make up my rent, but honestly I’m just happy being his friend.”

Natasha pushed one of the Sangria’s into Darcy’s hands.  “I was once on a mission with him.  We were just wrapping everything up.  I told him we should go celebrate and that there was a girl in accounting who really liked dancing and might like him.  His response, ‘Peggy was supposed to teach me to dance.’”

Darcy groaned, “Does he do this on purpose?  I’m starting to think it’s intentional.” Before knocking back her sangria and refilling it.

“It’s about 50/50 by my reckoning.  Depends on who he’s talking to.  If it’s Stark it’s always intentional, he tries to trip me up occasionally.  I think he forgets I wasn’t raised in this country so I don’t buy into the whole ‘innocent’ act that he has.”

“Have you ever seen him use that act on conservative politician?  They’re so flummoxed by it that they don’t realize they’ll have just agreed to host a ‘walk for planned parenthood.’”

“Watching people backtrack from whatever they agreed to do whenever he lays on the charm is half the reason I don’t sleep during debriefs.”

Half an hour later, they had finished their sangria, made plans to grab lunch the next week and were heading out. 

“It’s been fun, Tasha?”  Darcy snorted at the glare Natasha gave her, “but next time we go shopping, let me buy my own stuff?”

Natasha waved her off.  “That’s a discussion for next time.”

“At least don’t make Steve pay for it?”

“If it bothers you so much, treat him for ‘dinner’ at one of your crappy pizza places.”

The tone of voice caught Darcy’s attention.  There was an edge to it that surprised her, it was an obvious tell.  “You were the one who suggested The Obeslisk, weren’t you?”

Natasha’s eyes narrowed and she turned and left.  As she was walking away Darcy called out, “It looked awesome, just way too fancy!”

“I’ve just learned that you have terrible taste.”

The party wasn’t quite as fun as the last few, though Steve’s mouth did drop open at her in the knee length lace gown.  After that the evening went a little downhill.  Steve was clearly grumpy and the room could tell.  The ‘leave me alone vibes’ he was sending off were strong enough that an hour in, Darcy pulled him off to a balcony.  Linking her arms with his she leaned in to give the appearance of intimacy.

“Okay, what’s up big guy?”

“I’m okay.”

“First off, that’s not what I asked.  Second, you clearly have a stick up your ass about something.  You’ve scared everyone in there away from you.  It’s a good skill to have, but didn’t you say tonight was a fundraiser for a women’s shelter?”

He sighed, and stared out.  “In that dress, with all that lace, you remind me of the kind of gal my friend would bring home back in the day.”

There was a pit in her stomach.  It was another reminder of everything he had lost.  Joking about it earlier in the day with Natasha made it so much harder to stomach now.  Instead of looking at him she looked at the skyline.  Consciously not looking at him, she asked the difficult question, “do you want to tell me about him?”

“Nah, jerk would never have let me live it down if he knew I was talking him up to a gal like you.  Would’ve laughed himself hoarse finding out I was his wingman instead of the other way around.”  Darcy turned just enough that she could see the smile blooming on his face.  “Found two girls so we could double date to the Stark Expo.  He ended up with both of them at the end of the night.  Sounded like they had a good time from the couch outside the bedroom.”  He sounded far too fond for a story where he ended up sexiled.

As the silence extended, she could see his face fall again.  “Do you want to leave early?  I can make sure to stick to non-lace dresses from now on.”

“No, no.  We’re here to fundraise, and it’s for a good cause.  I can pull the, as you called it, stick out of my ass for the rest of the evening.  And don’t, you look lovely.”

Darcy pulled him down to kiss him on the cheek.  While rubbing off the smear of lipstick she left she told him, “Steve Rogers, you are a good man.” Once his cheek was rosy pink she smiled, “let’s go schmooze some rich people.”

 

For the fifth party, and she was starting to ask herself why Steve only had fancy parties to attend, she debated what to wear.  The lace dress had clearly set something off, but the second dress Natasha/Steve had gotten for her was also lace.  The problem was she didn’t know how many repeats were going to be at that nights party.  Steve probably wouldn’t care if everyone thought that his date was re-wearing clothes at a ridiculous pace, but Darcy didn’t want to deal with the judging eyes.

Finally she broke down, ‘So, the lace dress put him in a foul mood last time, do I risk it with the other one too?’  While waiting for an answer she knew that she could at least start on hair and makeup. 

After finishing putting the final twist in the French twist, and curling a few bits of outlying hair she checked her phone again.  ‘He seems like he recovered from that well if it set him off.  I’d risk it.’ You didn’t question Natasha so Darcy followed the advice. 

He didn’t look surprised to see her in another lace dress.  She almost felt the need to apologize, but swallowed all that down.  He didn’t need her to point anything out before they had to go pretend to be a couple in front of an audience. 

The party went fairly well.  It was another event with a lot of politicians.  There was a lot of shaking hands, and people asking for pictures with Steve.  Darcy volunteered to take most of the pictures, she didn’t exactly want to end up in the news as the woman standing between Captain America and whoever wanted their picture taken. 

Still, while Steve wasn’t visibly upset, he was still holding himself carefully.

At the end of the evening the got into a cab and before Steve could tell the driver her address, as he had gotten into the habit of doing, Darcy asked, “can you take us somewhere we can get a bite to eat?”

“Of course.” 

The driver pulled up outside of a bookstore in Dupont, with a café attached.  “Hey honey,” Darcy exclaimed, “It’s where we met!”  It seemed strange that this is where they would end up, but there was no point in questioning the coincidence.

Darcy dragged Steve out of the car and pulled him to the door.  By that time he had caught on to the fact that he was going to have to just follow Darcy and trailed her through the books and back to grab a table. 

They ordered an app and Darcy let Steve sit and quasi-brood until the food arrived.  She grabbed a small bite and pushed the plate towards him. 

“My treat.”  She offered when he just stared at the food.  Waiting until he had taken a bite so that he couldn’t argue, “Steve, you have a right to be happy.”  Then she stopped, everything else would sound trite or cliché.  Any attempt to say ‘your friends would want you to be happy,’ would come off as condescending or worse, make him try to hide negative emotions.

He coughed on his food and swallowed loudly.  “I, I know that?”

She gave up on trying to find the right words, “Look, I want to say something like ‘your friends would want you to be happy,’ but I think it’s also perfectly understandable for you to still be in a mourning period.  It’s been, what, two years since your entire life changed?  I just, I want you to have someone to talk to.  And I understand, for so many reasons, why you might not want that to be me.  But do you have someone?”

Steve looked uncomfortable, “I don’t have a problem.  I don’t need to talk to someone.” 

“Needing to talk to someone doesn’t mean you have a problem.  Hell if I could afford it I’d probably have a therapist on speed dial.  I mean, meeting Thor, that was an experience I could have used some help with.  But I’m not even talking about a therapist.  I’m talking a friend.  You mentioned your friend that you used to double date with.  Have you told anyone his name?”

It was quiet again, and Darcy appreciate the hustle and bustle of the café.  If it had been completely silent she wouldn’t have known what to do, but noise she could handle.  She picked up a chip and let her mind wander until Steve was ready to talk. 

“I do.  I do have people to talk to, but it can be hard to talk to them.  These moments pop up when I having fun or just talking to people and part of me doesn’t want to impress any of my difficulty on them when everything else is going so well.”

“Steve,” she covered his hand with hers, “this is me pushing.  Tell me anything.  I don’t care if it’s sad, or if it seems like something inconsequential.  If you need to talk, I’m here to listen.”

Yet again, the silence lasted long enough that her hand on his started to feel uncomfortable so she grabbed a bit of nacho to cover up her pulling back.

“Bucky.  His name was Bucky.”  Steve was staring at his hands.  “He was my best friend, saved me whenever I got in over my head.”  He looked up at her and smiled sadly, “Always knew what to say to get me to laugh, get me out of my head.”

“Sounds like he was a good guy.”

“The best,” the response was immediate and forceful, there was no doubt in his mind.

Once she got him started it seemed like he couldn’t stop.  They finished off the nachos and the place slowly cleared out.  At 1 am, the place kicked them out and Darcy left a sizable tip.  Stepping outside, into the cool air, was almost a revelation.

Steve walked like he was lighter and Darcy could relax knowing that she had helped. 

He turned to her, “So, I’m not trying to get fresh, but I live in the neighborhood.  I know it’s a long way back to your place.  Do you want to stay with me and I’ll take you home tomorrow.”

Darcy chuckled, “Sure sounds like you’re trying to get a bit fresh,” and continued laughing at his slightly stammered disagreement.  “Sure, not sure I’d stay awake in the cab anyway.  Do you have something I can steal for the night, this,” she gestured at the floor-length dress, “probably doesn’t make good sleepwear.”

“Of course.  As long as you don’t mind sweatpants and t-shirts.”

As promised, he gave her a pair of sweatpants that she had to roll the pant legs on and a t-shirt that fit unflatteringly around her chest, “got anything looser up top?”  she yelled out the bathroom door.  A moment later there was a knock and a hand reached through the cracked doorway to hand her a large sweatshirt.

“At least I match” she said as she walked out, doing a models turn in his living room to show off the gray sweats.  “Also, give me a day and let me decorate this place, please.”  The apartment was fairly bare bones.  Books were stacked in the corners of the room, but the rest of the apartments seemed mainly untouched. Beige walls, and paintings that weren’t hung up.  The furniture all looked like it came from a catalogue one step up from ikea: all uncomfortable, slightly sterile and looking like it cost way more than the furniture should be worth. 

“Where’s the couch?” she asked.

“Bedroom’s through there.”  He pointed down the hallway.

She rolled her eyes, “I’m not taking your bed.  Where’s the couch?”

“I don’t have one,” he mumbled.

“I’m telling Natasha that and next time we hang out we’re gonna buy you the squishiest most ridiculous couch we can find.”

She wouldn’t let his sleep on the floor or in a chair, and he wouldn’t stop trying to give away his bed.  They ended up sleeping next to each other and in the morning woke with their limbs tangled.  Darcy laughed and pulled herself away from Steve who was not quite snoring to use the bathroom.  When she came out, Steve was yawning and rubbing his eyes.

“Sleep well?” She asked, startling him.

He coughed to cover it up, “Yeah, I really did.” 

“I’m gonna head out, no, no,”  she waved him off, “I promise I can get home from here.  Anytime you need a professional cuddler, though, you know where to find me.”  She kissed him on the forehead, winked at his surprised expression and went home to laze away the day.


	4. Foreshadowing, What's that?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve cancels a date, there's no way this could be foreboding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm making it just under the wire this Sunday. It was a great weekend. I got to see a lot of my friends while eating good food and good beer. I hope you enjoy this chapter!

In the middle of a call with Jane she realized that she was going to have to come up with a reason for her additional income.  Jane knew almost every embarrassing secret that Darcy had, but Darcy being a fake girlfriend wasn’t embarrassing for just Darcy.  It was Steve’s secret too and Darcy didn’t really want to out him, especially after they had spent so much time coming up with a cover story about how they met.

And after all, it was just a little white lie.  “I’ve been tutoring some students in coding and political science.”  She blurted out.

There was a five second pause, “Is that a single class, or are you tutoring multiple people?”

Darcy laughed, “at this point I could probably teach that class, but no, I’m working with a bunch of kids… But that’s not super important.  What is super important is that if you happen to be in DC for a conference I can finally pay for my own drinks when we go out.”

“Oooh, how fancy.”  Jane purred, “But at this point I might need you to cover for me.  Funding fell through considering I’m not allowed to publish any of my papers, and Culver has reached the end of their budget where my research is concerned.  At least if its,” Jane adopted a stuffy voice, “’in the same vein as this fantasy that you’re trying to follow.’”

“Ooof, Jane.  Was that Mr. Big Nose, Big Tie, Big Ego?”

“I’ve renamed him Mr. Young Lady.  I’m so sick of him talking down to me.”

“I’m sorry Janie.  I know it’s not much but I’ll keep an ear to the ground and see if I can point anybody in your direction.”

They talked for a few more minutes, but all the budget talk had clearly bummed Jane out so they said their goodbyes and Darcy let her phone fall on the bed next to her.  It had been a long week, and she was supposed to go on a date with Steve the next day.  And she wasn’t going to buy a new dress already, she was glaring at the ceiling putting off making a decision.  It might have been a minor decision but, ugh, she didn’t want to make it.

Her phone buzzed again and she picked it up and put it to her ear, “Forget to tell me something Janie?”

A throat cleared, “No?”

It was Steve, “sorry, thought it might be my friend calling me back.  Whatsup Stevie-boy?”

“I’m sorry to do this so last minute, but I’ve been called to a… work thing.”

If Darcy hadn’t known who Steve was that tone of voice would have worried her.  But with the mantle of ‘Captain America’ came limitations as to who was allowed to know what.

“You’re gonna cancel tomorrow.”  She suggested, tone probably a little bit happier than it needed to be.  But hey, girl had a long shift that day, and a short one the next.  Having a little r&r, a chance to catch up with some friends on the libraries computer, sounded amazing.

“Yeah, you got it in one.  I can still pay you for your time…”

“Nope, you already bought me dresses, I think a night you cancel can be my treat.” 

“Thanks, I... I appreciate it.  I’ll talk to you after I get back.  Maybe you, Nat, and I can grab dinner?”

“As long as I’m still off the clock for that.  Besides you don’t want me to be Nat’s girlfriend too, do you?”

“Well it would make quite the pretty picture wouldn’t it?”

The startled laugh burst out of her, “Oh my god, Steve.  Where have you been hiding that sense of humor?  I remember back in the day where you would blush if you just glanced near my chest.” 

“I think you and I remember our history very differently.”

“So you didn’t blush when you looked at my chest?”

“I... I didn’t say that…” 

Darcy giggled to herself, “You’re fine, Steve.  Good luck at work.  Let me know when you get back safe and sound.”  She emphasized safe.  It was clear the man didn’t know how to look after himself.

She hung up the phone, yet again letting it drop on her bed and practically wriggled in anticipation of what she could do.  After thinking for a few moments she grabbed her phone again, made sure it was plugged in and downloaded the Netflix app.  She might not have a computer or tv, but she could still load everything. She signed up for the free trial realizing that for the first time ever she could afford to pay for her own Netflix instead of bumming off a friend.

She took the time to put on her pajamas and curl up under her comforter (one of the only nice things she spent her hard earned money on) and started to browse through shows.

The next day started with the early shift, but she was home by noon.  Her evening opened up before her.  Suddenly life was full of possibilities.  With all those possibilities, Darcy chose one of her boring options. She went the library for some solid computer time.

She chose the computer farthest to the end, and closest to the wall.  Yeah, it was a pain to walk past a ton of people, and yeah, if something were to happen it would be a bitch to get out of, but no one could look over her shoulder.

A quick double check of email and a browse of a few of the more reputable news sites and Darcy could finally devote her time to what she actually wanted to do.  Going into safe browsing, adding on a few extra protections and logging into an encoded chat room with a few of her friends.  It took about 10 minutes to see what the more recent projects were, if anyone had anything interesting they were trying to do. 

It was moments like that, that made Darcy happy to be a bit paranoid about her computer habits.  While a few of the projects were the regular things: hack into a government agency, collect information about this semi-legal topic, Fred (and it was always Fred) was back on his weird pornography trip.  While it wasn’t like there was a picture on the screen, there were still some pretty lewd sentences.

Darcy looked at what people were asking for, tapped one of her friends’ icons and went to work. 

After a few hours, Darcy’s fingers were pretty tired and she was getting the evil eye from the librarian.  Tapping out a few last letters, she finished working on her part of the project, said goodbye to the couple of people she had been talking to and did everything she knew to wipe the computer’s memories of the last couple of hours.

As a cover she went and grabbed the first book she could think of, a history of Captain America, because Steve would be so embarrassed to know she picked one up, much less read it.

Through the next week she made her way slowly through the biography.  Work still took up too much time, and she spent another couple of hours at the library ‘spending time’ with her friends from her misspent youth.

She had just gotten to the section where Steve was trying to enlist and had already failed 10 times.  Her phone buzzed.  The screen came to life and Darcy quickly flipped it over so that it wouldn’t distract her from her reading. While Steve had talked about joining the army she never realized quite how hard had to work for it.

Her phone buzzed again. 

She ignored it.

It buzzed again.

Three texts in a row was enough to get her attention.  The last time that had happened was when one of her friends had seen her at the scene of the London disaster.

Warily she picked up her phone.  The texts were all from Jane.  “TURN ON THE NEWS!”  “DARCY ARE YOU OKAY?” “SERIOUSLY, TURN ON THE NEWS AND TEXT ME AS SOON AS YOU CAN!”

Darcy shot off a quick text to let Jane know that she was alive and uninjured while going into the living room.  She didn’t spend much time there as the couch was always covered in things she didn’t want to sit on, and she didn’t have the time to waste.

But the tv there at least had some basic channels.  Turning the tv on, changing it from E! to CNN and Darcy felt all the air rush out of her.

On screen was Steve on his knees staring into the barrel of a gun.  The ticker line across the bottom read “Captain America a terrorist.  SHIELD is calling for his arrest.”  Darcy couldn’t read any of the other headlines as she watched as Steve and Natasha were handcuffed and shoved into a van.

Not bothering to turn off the television, Darcy ran for her bag, phone, and headphones.  She turned CNN on her phone and continued to watch the news as she hustled for the library.  All the time cursing that she still hadn’t had the money or time to replace her computer.

At no other point has anyone in history run so quickly to a library as she did that day.  She beelined for her normal computer, leaned her phone against the wall, plugged it into the outlet so that she could keep the running commentary in her ear, and removed one earbud so that she could focus.

Fingers whizzed over the keys as she put up all of her normal defenses and a few that she had been working on.  If today went badly she would need all the protection she could get.

She logged into her chatroom and sent out an alert. 

“Guys, I know this sounds crazy but I know Steve Rogers.  He’s a good guy and he’s clearly being framed.  Anyone whose available, if you could help me pull some information together to prove that he’s being framed I’d owe you one big time.”

She split screened her computer so that she could start digging while keeping an eye out to see what other people were finding.  

There wasn’t time to dig deep into anything, Darcy knew the library closed earlier than she would have liked, so she didn’t bother hacking SHIELD.  But there was always information from his original service record that was easily pulled, as well as a few other quasi-legal sites.  Not that she expected she would ever tell anyone where she found any of it.  She was hoping that no one would be able to trace it back to her.

Meanwhile, the group chat was filling up with people offering to check different sites and compiling data.  Luckily one of them had an in with a news website that was happy to play a whistle-blower for anonymous internet users. 

Darcy abandoned the meat of her project and started to put the information together into a cohesive format.  Here’s a fact, link to the legal source, story to go along with it, with just a dash of a smear campaign on his captors.  (One of the men on the television was an easy google search away.  Brock Rumlow had a number of secrets hiding in his past).

Her phone buzzed, and unlike last time she knew to check it immediately.  It was a unknown number but the message made it obvious who it was from.  “I’m doing something drastic but I’m going to need your computer skills.  Meet me at GCDC at 11.”

It was 9:30.  Darcy thanked her friends for their generous help.  Put her finished material in the group box so it could be passed on to any possibly helpful sources and logged herself out.

There would be just enough time to get to the middle of the city. 

She was slightly off in her estimate, the metro had started running fewer trains later in the evening.  The restaurant was surprisingly busy for that time of night in such a business-focused area, but she walked in and started to (she thought, subtly) look around for Natasha. 

Standing in line, she pretended to look at the menu before feeling fingers whisper across her arm.  She glanced to her right and there was Natasha, cleverly hidden in a hoodie and glasses.

“You’re obviously looking for someone.”

“Yeah and you look the way celebrities do when they’re trying to ‘hide’ but clearly want the paparazzi to find them.” 

“You’d be surprised how often that works.  Order a drink and then follow me.” 

Darcy got her lemonade (while the grilled cheese place had alcohol and Darcy wanted some really badly this didn’t seem like exactly the right time to partake), and went back to her obvious search for Natasha.  Natasha was standing just inside the door, because of course she was.  There’s a national manhunt going on, it didn’t really make sense to dress like a celebrity and stand in a doorway, but it was Natasha.  It had to make sense somehow.

Before Darcy could reach her Natasha had hailed a taxi and gotten in.  Darcy was left awkwardly sliding in beside her.  They drove to a bunker in the middle of nowhere.  Natasha walked in like she owned the place and pointed Darcy towards the kitchen where a laptop was set up on the counter. 

“You’re bringing more people into this now?”  A thin, though muscular black man asked.

“Darcy, Sam.”  Natasha introduced bluntly.  As if no other information was necessary.  Though in a situation like this, too many details could be damning. 

“Hey Sam.  Nice to meet you.  Wish it wasn’t while this one,” she jerked her head at Natasha, “was wanted for being,” she adopted a terrible Russian accent, “a cold war spy.”

Sam tilted his head, “Now I can see why you two would get along.”

“I resent that,” Natasha mimicked Darcy’s horrible Russian accent.

“And now I have two comedians.  I’ll leave you be.”  He grabbed a drink out of the refrigerator and went into the other room.

 “I know you’re good with computers.  I need your help with something, a computer something.” 

 “Didn’t you learn basic hacking with SHIELD?”

“There’s a difference between proficiency and excellence.”

“You know Tony Stark, not sure my hobbyist hacking counts as excellent.”

“And yet, one of you is here now.”

Natasha wanted her to write a hacking program and go over some beyond-the-basics tactics of how to get into a system. 

“You know it depends on the system right?”

Natasha rolled her eyes, “We have limited time.  Of course I know it depends on the system.  Just do your best.  If you fuck up, we all die.  No pressure.”

“Yeah, that was not helpful! Having been in a few life or death situations.  Pressure very much not appreciated.”

They worked for a couple of hours and Darcy did her best with a program she had originally created for a creepy professor (he tried to dock my grades when I wouldn’t let him motorboat, this found some unfortunate porn through his university email and sent it directly to the dean) and loaded onto a USB and handed over.  “Think you can handle this?”

“Not like I have a choice.  Now, I want you to leave.”

Darcy was taken aback.  “You drag me all the way out here…”

“No, I mean, you need to leave DC.  It doesn’t matter if we succeed or fail, it’s not going to be a safe place for the next few days.  I have a friend in New Jersey, take his number.  He’ll get you somewhere safe. Tell him a mutual friend has hit his head often enough that he owes her.”  Natasha handed her an envelope and then pulled her into a hug.  The casual affection would have been surprising, but having been in her share of pant-shitting experiences, Darcy understood the kind of stuff people do when they thought they were going to die.  In her case, she started an unfortunate tryst after surviving her life or death situation.  Ian was fine, but they both knew it was doomed from the start.

She caught a glimpse of Steve on her way out, she smiled as cheerily as she could at him, trying to hide her sense of unease.  He waved a little, “See you on the other side?”  He offered.

“Sure thing Cap, just send me a time and place.”

Then she was whisked away to a train station where she bought the world’s most expensive ticket for an overnight train.  In her mind, she kissed Netflix goodbye.  Any money she would have spent on her little something fun had been relegated to saving her life.

She set an alarm and tried to catch a little bit of sleep, to no avail.  20 minutes before arriving in Newark she opened the envelope.  In it was a tiny stack of cash (Yay maybe her dreams of being a Netflix subscriber didn’t have to die) and a phone number. 

The train was dead silent as the phone rang.

“Hey,” the phone answered, followed by “shit!” and the sounds of someone tripping or knocking over a stack of something.  “whew.  Hey whatsup.”

“Um, I was given this number to call in case of an emergency.  Our mutual friend said something about her hitting you in the head and you owing her?”

There was a throaty chuckle.  “Ah, Nat’s friend.  I’ll be at the station in 20.”

Darcy waited in the chill morning, goosebumps dotting her arms underneath her jacket.   Even with arms crossed she was having trouble conserving heat, which is why she didn’t immediately notice the sole car pull into the roundabout in front of the station. 

“You Darcy?”  A blonde man yelled out the window.  The car was an old, poorly cared for Honda Civic and between the beat up look of the car and the beat up look of the man Darcy was tempted to say no.

“Yeah?  I’d ask who you are but between you and Natasha I never actually got a name.”

He scratched the back of his head.  “Sorry, but it’s early?” He wasn’t wrong.  At 6 am she was having a hard time staying upright.  “I’m Clint, and this here’s Lucky.  Didn’t want to leave him alone.  He’d eat all my pizza.”

The dog in the backseat of the car finally got her moving.  Instead of going to the front seat she got in back with the dog, the dog that immediately jumped on her and started to lick her face.

“Aww, who’s a good boy?”  She asked.

“Why is that everyone’s first question?”  Clint bemoaned, “And why is the answer never me?”

“From your busted lip, broken nose, and black eye I would say it might have to do with an inability to not start trouble.”

“Hey!  I didn’t start this fight,” he waved as his purpled face, “I just finished it.”

“Suuureee,” Darcy drew out while vigorously petting the dog.

“Well, I can see why Nat likes you…I’m gonna take you somewhere safe, but then I gotta amscray right back here.  I have some unfinished business.”

“Didn’t you just say you finished whatever trouble you were in?”

He scoffed, and took one hand off the wheel, “Stop pointing out the inconsistencies in my personal narrative.”

“Did you pick the SAT vocabulary from Natasha?” She could see his eyes narrow in the rearview mirror, “Yeah, sorry, that was harsh.  It’s been a long terrifying day and I so desperately need to sleep.  Can I promise to buy you coffee next time we meet up and call it even if I stop talking and sleep the rest of the trip?”

He paused, “you drive a hard bargain, throw in a pizza for Lucky and you have a deal.”

“Great, let’s shake on it.”  She smiled, ignoring the hand Clint popped into the backseat.  Instead she grabbed Lucky’s paw and enjoyed the at faux outrage from Clint.


	5. Not-So- Grand New York Adventure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy is in New York while DC is being DC. While far from the middle of everything, she still does what she can to help out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey Everyone, it's been an absolutely crazy week, but through all the lows I really appreciated all of your comments. It made me perk up every time I saw a new one! 
> 
> I hope you like the new chapter!

Darcy slept the rest of the car ride, which wasn’t particularly long, and was surprised to wake up in New York City.  Even after living in Washington, DC for the past couple of months she was floored to make it into an actual city.  The buildings were taller than anything she was used to, and there was a level of grit and grime that was normally only found in the type of neighborhood that Darcy had made her home in.

She knew that she was staring like a country bumpkin but she had grown up in a series of small towns, gone to Culver University and then spent a few months out in the middle of a desert to finish up her college credits.  New York as a city was as foreign to her as a hot tub to a goldfish.  If the hot tub decided to slightly lower its temperature to a warm tub and forwent any of the chemicals.  Bigger, a little bit scarier, and eminently hotter (more mentally than physically in this case).  Hey, it was a shitty metaphor, but what was life other than one shitty metaphor after another.

They drove through streets and the roads started getting a little bit cleaner and the stores started to get a little more fancy to the point where Darcy with her goodwill clothes being driven around in an old shitty car started to feel uncomfortable and out of place.  When the pulled into one of the underground garage’s in Avengers Tower her jaw almost dropped.

“Where are we going?”

“Nat asked me to take you to her apartment.”

“And she lives in Avengers Tower?”  Darcy’s voice had gotten so high pitched that Clint winced and messed with his ears.

“Avoid tones like that, messes with my hearing aids.”  He was grumpy but after getting a literal wakeup call at an hour so early that it shouldn’t qualify as morning, picking up a stranger and driving her a distance away from home Darcy couldn’t begrudge him that. 

Clint parked haphazardly in a spot that said reserved, though Darcy didn’t want to point it out after all of the sarcastic comments she had made when they first met.  Trailing after him, she gawked at the fancy elevators and the plush carpeting and didn’t realize when Clint had stopped.  With a gentle bump against his back, she finally stopped and rested her head against his back while he put in the code to get into Natasha’s apartment.

He ushered her in and pushed her towards the couch.  “Before you leave, is there a computer I could borrow?  Might need to be a little powerful.”

“Sure thing, Sassy.”

He left the room and Darcy fell into the couch letting her eyes shut for just a minute, but was being lightly shaken in almost no time.  “Hey, computers on the table right there, I removed the password protection.  There should be some food in the fridge if you need any.  Gonna be okay?”

“Sure thing, dork.”  She muttered, having trouble keeping her eyes open.

“Whatever, Sassy.  I’m sure I’ll see you around.  Natasha doesn’t give up her people easily.”

He left silently while she fiddled with her phone, setting an alarm for a few hours later.  She knew there was work to be done, but she wasn’t a superhero, she needed to sleep.

With that done she let herself sink into the ridiculously comfortable couch and didn’t move for hours.

Waking up happened slowly. The feel of soft cloth underneath her face and hands, an ache that persisted throughout her body, the sound of a clock ticking.  The clock ticking brought her to consciousness.  Who owned a clock that ticked in the era of smartphones and digital clocks?  Certainly not Darcy.

A quick look around showed one thing: Natasha clearly adored her comfort.  The carpet was plush, on the walls hung a few tasteful landscapes, the biggest TV Darcy had ever seen was hanging on the wall right in front of her, and the couch was so soft and comfortable that even having just woken up, Darcy was tempted to go back to sleep.

In that moment, of looking around at everything that had been carefully picked out, and the tasteful little details that would have been so easy to miss; the bookshelf that was built into the table in front of the couch, the handmade blanket sitting on a hamper, Darcy was terrified. 

Natasha had always seemed like this automaton of a woman, one that had been programmed with a sense of humor, but an automaton all the same.  But here, it was impossible to ignore, Natasha was oh so human, with her store of trashy romance novels, and the hideous wooden carving (Darcy had to assume that someone important, maybe Clint, had gotten for her) that rested on the counter.  Natasha was human and there was a chance that this gamble she and Steve were taking wouldn’t end well, that they wouldn’t come home.

She allowed herself a full five minutes to panic.  Sitting on the couch, she balled up her hands and fought tears.  In such a short time, these people had become so important.  And Darcy was far away from the action, there was nothing she could physically do to help.  Beyond that, she hadn’t exactly been trained in any form of combat and her trusty taser could only get her so far.

But she did have a skill.  A skill she knew would be helpful.

When the five minutes were up, she rubbed her face to wipe away the few tears that had managed to escape and got to work.  She set up the fancy, and of course it was fancy (Natasha clearly enjoyed a slightly frivolous lifestyle) computer on the table in front of the couch, turned on the TV to CNN and trained her phone to another news site and pulled out one of the only things that she had brought with her from DC.  One of the five things she never traveled without: credit card, id, phone, taser and of course her trusty external hard drive.

She sat on the floor, knowing the sofa would making a nap a little too tempting, and got to work.  From what Natasha had told her, at the point where she and Steve would be making their moves, information would be streaming out of SHIELD.  Darcy wanted to make sure that she was on top of all of that.

First thing she put a warning up in her group’s site.  She had an inkling that a few members either lived in the DC area or had contacts in or around DC.  If she had the ability to give them a warning to get to safety she would take it.  The warning had the side benefit of getting a few people interested in helping out. 

They collectively decided to download as much of the information as they could.  Darcy had already planned to do that, hence her handy-dandy hard drive.  Everyone knew that as soon as some organization took over for SHIELD that the first thing they would do would be to take down as much incriminating information about their predecessor as they could.  Organizations often grew along the backbone of their failed forebears.

Luckily Darcy knew where the information would show up due to the usb that she had given Natasha.

Darcy did have a side game planned.  She wanted to make sure that her friends wouldn’t be wholly compromised by the planned leak and knew what to keep an eye out for to keep at least a few identities hidden, or at least as hidden as anything could be on the internet.

Darcy had to assume that Natasha and Steve had made it into the building without too many difficulties when data started leaking all over.  The news stations hadn’t managed to pick up on their infiltration attempt but couldn’t miss the sudden stream of information. 

As Darcy’s fingers whispered over her keyboard she stifled a laugh at the talking heads on the news.  While they couldn’t miss the information they clearly didn’t know what to do with it.  Half of the panel was still talking about Steve as if he was a terrorist.  The shaky footage they managed to get of someone holding a gun to Steve stopped any laughter. 

Darcy’s hands almost shook remembering yet again, that Natasha and Steve were both fallible.  One deep breath in, one deep breath out, and she reminded herself that there was nothing she could do at such a distance and went back to doing what she could do.

She sent information about Hydra's past hidden within SHIELD to some of her friends while also making sure that the information cleared the important people.

She worked through watching the Triskelion fall.

She worked through watching three helicarriers fly into the sky.

She worked through watching those Helicarriers fall.

She worked through tears as it was announced that Captain America could not be found in the aftermath.

She worked.

 

At some point in the night she had pulled herself onto the couch and drifted off.  She woke up with puffy eyes and sore hands.  Rustling around Natasha’s apartment, she searched desperately for coffee.  Even after having gotten a good couple of hours of sleep she was tired enough that she couldn’t keep her eyes from crossing as she tried to read some of the information she had pulled the day before.

Unfortunately, Natasha didn’t seem to have any coffee in the apartment, just a fairly large assortment of tea.  After finding the box of tea that seemed like it would have the most caffeine in it, she popped a cup of water into the microwave and turned back to the news.

Steve still hadn’t been found, although Natasha’s face was starting to pop up more and more.  There was a mention of a hearing.  For a spy, having a recognizable face would be a death sentence. 

The microwave beeped and Darcy pulled the cup and dropped a tea bag in before going back to the couch.  She was still having trouble concentrating but the faint smell of tea seemed to soothe her.

Pulling her computer towards her, she shifted through the documents, sorting the information into a few different categories.  One for Steve, one for Natasha, one for potential recruits, anything that mentioned hydra… it was long work. 

The tea was half gone and what was left was lukewarm when Darcy’s phone rang.

“Yello.” She answered, holding the phone between her shoulder and her ear.

“Is this Darcy?”

“Yes?”

“It’s Sam, we met the other day at the bunker.”

“Oh, you’re alive, that’s awesome.”  Darcy said softly, still mostly focused on the document in front of her.  The text was tiny and the prose was dense. 

“Yeah, I was looking through Cap’s phone, and this looks like the number he contacted the most.”

The phone dropped as her head shot up.  She shoved the computer sideways onto the couch, grabbed her phone and started to pace. “Cap, you mean Steve.  Is he okay?  Do you have any news?”

“First things first, breathe.  Steve is fine, they found him on the side of a river bank.  He’s pretty beat up.  I figured if you were close you might want to come visit him in the hospital.”

“Yes.”  Darcy stated, almost before Sam had finished talking.  “I’ll be on the first train out.  Which hospital?”

Sam told her the address and the room number and Darcy got back to her computer, exiting out of all the screens she had opened she pulled up the train schedule.  Money be damned, she booked the Acela that left the station shortly after 10 am.  That gave her 40 minutes to get there and, she checked google maps, it would take half an hour. 

She grabbed all her things and got into the elevator while calling an uber to get her to the train station.

There are a lot of situations where it makes sense to save money.  Finding out that a friend who might have been dead wasn’t actually dead was not one of those situations. 

It might have been a fast train with no local stops but it felt like the trip took forever.  She couldn’t focus to read a book, didn’t have a computer to look through more of the data she had pulled, and staring out at the scenery made her nauseous.  As the train pulled into Union Station, she was the first one off, almost jogging off the platform and to the metro to get to the hospital.

She took a moment to pull herself together, there was always someone hysterical in a hospital and Darcy was not ready for it to be her.  The hallways were practically a labyrinth, but she followed the signs to the room Sam had told her about.  A quick glance through the window showed she was in the right place. 

There was a curtain around the bed, but she could see a jacket of Natasha’s and a man was pretty sure was Sam, but hey they only saw each other for a minute so she could be wrong. 

She knocked and Sam looked up, waving her in.

“Just to make clear, he’s going to be alright, right?”

“Yeah,” Sam spoke softly and calmly, an attitude which affected Darcy, though only slightly, “with his souped-up healing ability they think he should be out of here in a week or so.”

“Oh thank god.  I’m gonna grab a coffee, you want one?”

He stared at her for a second.  “No thank you?” 

She shrugged and went to find coffee.  10 hours of sleep over the last 48 hours combined with the anxious pit in her throat made it hard to keep vertical and Natasha’s tea had started to wear off. 

Heading towards the lobby of the building, she let her nose lead her to the coffee, unfortunately a Starbucks (once you’ve worked there, the magic is gone), but she didn’t want to leave the hospital so ordered her coffee and added a little cream and a lot of sugar.

Back in Steve’s room, Sam was reading a book and Darcy all but collapsed into the other chair in the room, and let her bag droop to the floor.  The coffee was gone depressingly fast, and she was back to the waiting game.

Sam seemed perfectly content and Darcy didn’t feel like interrupting him to talk.  Instead, she pulled out her phone and started searching through the news, waiting for evidence of Captain America’s survival to hit the 24 hours news cycle.

She was so engrossed on figuring out the timeline that she didn’t notice when Steve started to wake up.  In her defense, he was also on the other side of a curtain, and she had earbuds in.

Sam pulled the curtain, and it was clear this wasn’t the first time Steve woke up, considering he didn’t seem surprised to see Sam.  At the point where he saw Darcy he smiled, though it looked pained.

“Told you I’d see you on the other side.”  

“The other side was not supposed to mean you almost dying!”

He frowned and fiddled with the monitor they had on his fingers, “Funny, I don’t feel dead.”

Darcy took a step back.  She was fine with being flippant through a number of situations, but this… “Oh, so I think you’re dead, find out you aren’t, practically run here from New York and you’re making jokes.”  She felt frustrated tears gather in the corners of her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose.  “Look, Steve, I’ll be back.  I promise I will, but I need to get some actual sleep first.”  She grabbed her bag, grimaced at Sam and left. 

Returning to her crappy apartment had never been so hard.  In the last two days she had been, peripherally, in the middle of something incredibly important.  Now she had a weeks worth of shifts at Starbucks to look forward to. 

Instead of dwelling, she shut herself into her room, closed all the blinds, and turned off her phone.  All the while part of her wished she was back in New York on Natasha’s amazing couch. 


	6. Life is full of interludes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time for a Montage!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this past week and a half has been rough. And this chapter isn't long enough to be a weekly update. So, enjoy! Normal post will be up this Saturday/Sunday!

The next day Darcy went to work and at the end of her early shift she stood just outside the glass door. She practically reeked of coffee and wanted a plan for the rest of the day. 

For just a moment she considered going to visit Steve, but she was still internally fuming.  At this point she could already tell it was irrational.  That the anger was building on itself.  But she could care later.

Instead, she texted one of her college friends, one of the lucky ones who managed to not only get a job, but to get a job that paid fairly well.  Darcy was ready to go for broke, and was almost there after the train tickets (the money that Natasha gave her was still tucked in her bag.  It didn’t seem right to take it).  She wanted to go out and dance her frustration away. 

It ended up being a fun, but expensive night.  Darcy worked out her frustrations in more than one way.  She stretched languidly as she walked to the metro to get home the next morning.

The day after that, she still didn’t visit Steve.  Instead she went to the library to thank her friends and continue to sift through the information she had. 

The fourth day after leaving Steve in a huff she had run out of excuses and hung out with Leslie watching mindless television.

Day number five and Darcy had a double shift.  She didn’t leave work until really late because her bank account was low enough to dictate her life again.  It was a long metro ride home.

In front of her building, she paused.  There was a dark figured sitting on the stoop of her building.  Normally it wouldn’t be a problem, but the lights on the side of the building were all out.

She stuck her hand in her bag and relaxed once her fingers felt her trusty taser. 

There was no way into the building except to go past the man.  She cleared her throat at the base of the stairs, making sure that she had room to run if she needed it.  The man looked up and his golden hair was suddenly recognizable.

“Steve.”  She said, shocked.

“Darcy.  I wanted to come and say goodbye.”

“What?”

“Bucky is back.”  His voice broke, and a shaky smile took over his face.

“How?  No, I don’t need to know.  It’s probably classified anyway.”  She paused, “I’m sorry for not coming back to visit you.  It was a crazy week and I was taking it out on you.”

He ran a hand through his hair and walked towards her.  “I get it.  I just, I didn’t want to disappear without at least letting you know.  We're going to be on radio-silent for a while.”

“Thanks,” she laid a hand on his arm.  “I wish you the best of luck.”

He pulled her into a hug, and into her hair, said “I really appreciate all your help.”

She patted his back, “It really was my pleasure.  And my paycheck.”

He chuckled slightly, and pulled back, “I’m glad I chose you.”

“Well, whenever you find you ‘best pal,’ let me know.  I’d love to meet him.”

Steve smiled, “Of course.  Between you and Natasha he’ll be the cat who ate the canary.”

They finished saying their goodbyes and all the way up to her apartment Darcy wished that she had swallowed her pride just a little bit earlier.  After all who knew how long it would take before he would be able to find his friend.


	7. Occasionally nepotism is a good thing.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy gets a job! A job other than Starbucks! A Job that requires a move! And a few old friends reappear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, first things first. I know finding a place to live in NYC is nowhere as easy as I make it seem - it's some of that hand-wavey stuff people do to make the story move.
> 
> Have fun, and let me know what you think!

Life went on.  Though it did get a little bit better.  Darcy spent plenty of time making sure the more interesting and important bits of information she picked up made it into the news.  Natasha clearly appreciated this as every time a story was told about some ‘newly uncovered information,’ Darcy would get a text from her with a smiley face.

She also, out of the blue, received paperwork from Stark Industries.  She called Natasha after that one.

“I feel like you probably had something to do with this.”  She told Natasha.  She was sitting on her ratty couch with the contract in her lap.

“I may have mentioned to Tony that I had a friend who had picked up everything I pulled from SHIELD’s database and when I pointed to the various places you had placed some information he was impressed.  It’s not much, but I figured it’s better than Starbucks?”

“Of course it is.  Is this contract right?  I’d get to work in Stark Tower?”

“It’s the Avengers tower now.”  She replied, drolly.

“Whatever, I don’t even care about the fact that I’m IT, look at this paycheck!!!”

There was silence on the other end of the line. 

“You don’t think it’s all that much, do you?”

She could hear the shrug over the phone, “Having worked in an industry where people would pay you to kill other people, most paychecks seem like peanuts to me.”

“Well that was scary and a bit condescending all in one sentence.”

Darcy packed up all of her stuff into just a few different boxes and rented a car to drive to New York.  The night before she left, she and Leslie bought a few bottles of wine and had a proper roommate night.  Leslie wasn’t nearly as bad as Darcy had thought.  In reality, she was struggling with a lot of the things that Darcy was; student loans, a job that didn’t use a college degree, a love of mindless television.  The biggest difference was Darcy had gotten fairly lucky with a gamble she took.

The morning that Darcy moved, she and Leslie hugged and said their quick goodbyes.  While Leslie went back to her room to sleep off the rest of her hangover, Darcy packed the car and took one more quick look at the broken building.  The foundation was still cracked, and none of the lights worked, and she was so fucking happy to be out of there. 

First things first, Darcy drove to New York and found a motel to stay in for a night or two before she could figure out housing.  Obviously, with Avengers Tower being such a booming business, any housing anywhere nearby would be way outside of her price range, even with the pay increase.  Instead she looked a little bit further out. 

It became clear pretty quickly that she was going to end up with a tiny studio apartment, and given the limited time, she just hoped it would be slightly better than the last one.

With a lot of luck, and proof of employment at Stark Industries, she found something reasonable on day 2, signed the lease and moved all of her boxes in all by herself.  She returned the car, took a cab to her new home and sat in the middle of her tiny apartment, all by herself, and couldn’t have been happier. 

That first night, she slept on her crappy craigslist futon, which was directly on the floor. Waking up, she had aches and pains she didn’t realize existed and vowed that her first decent paycheck would go to a nice mattress.  Actually her first paycheck would go to a computer, the second would go to a mattress.

From her boxes she pulled out only the basics; some clothes, her coffee pot and her slippers.  She didn’t own much in the way of actual furniture so there wasn’t much of a point in unpacking the rest of her stuff, not that there was much.  She hung up some of her music posters and blasted music on her phone to dance to while she hung everything up.

She spent the rest of the weekend slightly straightening up her apartment and walking around New York.  Luckily people in DC and people in New York had similar levels of “leave me the fuck alone” auras, so she fit right in. 

Monday, her first day of work, she found out that she was pretty much in IT.  And as she was the newest person on staff, she got to handle all of the ‘my computer isn’t working’ ‘have you tried turning it off and on again?’ kinds of questions.  It was amazing the kinds of things that people had trouble with: if the scanner doesn’t work the first time maybe restart it, if the paper in the printer jams maybe don’t tear off the part that is visible, if your keyboard isn’t working maybe check that it’s plugged in first.

Never underestimate the stupidity of mankind.

Yet, yet, the hours were fairly regular.  Stark Industries provided free coffee for all employees so she didn’t have to deal with anyone before their daily caffeine intake.  And the pay, the pay was enough that she could afford her apartment, her student loans, to eat more than just ramen, and miracle of miracle, still have enough left over to treat herself occasionally. 

“Jane, you wouldn’t believe it,” she was sprawled all over her brand new mattress, “it’s amazing.  I mean, the people kind of suck, but that shouldn’t surprise you.”

“Of course not, who else would have voluntarily gone all the way into the desert, but a misanthrope.”

Darcy giggled, “You’re going to have to come and visit at some point.”

“Well, I might have a conference coming up at some point.  Gonna keep me company at the hotel?”

“Are you getting a room with two doubles?”

“Well, I’m speaking so I think they’re actually getting me a room with two queen sized beds.”

“Throw in a fluffy bathrobe and access to the minibar and I’m all there.”

“For my favorite ex-intern?  Of course not.  You bring your own booze and snacks.”

Same old Jane.  “Speaking of your conference, I thought you weren’t allowed to speak about most of your research?”

“With SHIELD gone, there isn’t really anyone to tell me that I can’t talk about it anymore.  Funding is still an issue, but I’m hoping that this talk will drum up some interest.”

“Duct tape machines starting to fall apart again?”

Jane sighed, “I keep putting more duct tape on them but I think they’re nearing the end of their lifespan.”

“If that happens, call me and we’ll give those guys a proper goldfish burial.”

“We are NOT flushing my machines down a toilet!”

“I was thinking more shoebox in the backyard…”

“That’s for hamsters.”

Darcy frowned, “I thought that was just dinner.”

There was a stunned silence, “I really hope that’s a joke.”

“I lived in foster care, not the streets of a developing nation, Jane.”

“Oh, Okay.  Good.”  Darcy rolled her eyes at the reaction.  Jane didn’t always pick up on her sense of humor but rarely got offended which is why they had managed to become friends.  Darcy didn’t do well with the easily offended, and Jane didn’t do too well with people who constantly needed her full attention.

They finished their call and Darcy pulled her brand new, already slightly beat up, computer towards her.  She had a few places she needed to check before she could crash for the night.  There was a bit of chatter in her group about a mystery man that was popping up in a few locations. 

All the help they had given her had led to a few in-group conspiracy theories.  All the files about SHIELD’s enemies being released had made a few of the more paranoid people that much more paranoid.

Someone had been tracking what they thought might be the Winter Soldier, another was trying hunt down Kraven the Hunter,  another was trying to keep a list of what all the Avengers had been up to.  If it started to become a problem Darcy probably would have done something about it, but for now it was just a hobby of theirs.  Hobbies of that nature had come and gone every couple of months.  It was an intelligent group of people, and their minds liked to wander.

Except, something about the data points on some of the villains looked a little bit off.  Darcy looked at the clock one more time and realized that if she didn’t want to be the asshole who fell asleep during the department meeting, she probably needed to go to bed.  She looked at the data points one more time, and then shut everything down before turning off the light and rolling over.

 

A few days later at work she got a ping on her phone.  Natasha was back in town.  She had been conducting hearings in DC for the past few weeks and from what Darcy had seen the entire process looked exhausting. 

Darcy looked at the clock and replied that her lunch break was in an hour and suggested a café a block away. 

Natasha did look tired.  It wouldn’t have been obvious, except that Darcy already knew that she was.  It was in her first sentence.  “I’m tired.”

“Have you tried the coffee?  Stark, I mean, Avengers Tower has some good stuff.”

Natasha narrowed her eyes, “I know you dug around in my kitchen, which means you know I don’t drink coffee.”

Darcy shrugged, “Your loss.”

“Seems like the new job is treating you well.”

Darcy shrugged again, “Wouldn’t mind a few new responsibilities.  Mr. Norris has endless problems with anything that needs to be plugged in, and I wouldn’t mind having some other work to distract me.”  She took a sip of her drink, and then something came to her.  “You are not interfering here.  You already got me a job.  That’s more than enough.” 

“Fine, suffer with Mr. Norris.” 

“Honestly, I don’t know why you’ve bothered to spend time with me.  You got me a job, and other than the fact that I sometimes hung out with Captain America, I don’t think I have that much that…”

“You’ve also met Thor.”  Natasha broke in.  Darcy glared.  “You amuse me.  Also even though I clearly scare you, you don’t let me walk over you.  It’s nice, occasionally.” 

“As long as it’s me, and not a Senator, right?”  Darcy raised an eyebrow.

“They like to think I’m not walking all over them, but rock, meet widow’s bites.” 

They dug into their sandwiches and Darcy finally got around to asking, “So why did you really want to meet with me?”

Natasha’s eyes flickered around, making sure she wouldn’t be overheard.  “I think you know someone who might have information about someone our mutual friend is looking for.” 

It took Darcy a second for that to register.  “Oh, you mean Jerry?  He does stuff like this every couple of months.  Last year I think he tried to hunt down Bigfoot, his focus on Kraven is going to be short lived, I’m sure.”

Natasha, in a reaction that made Darcy nervous, looked confused.  “Kraven?”

“Yeah, guy who dresses up in leopard print and hunts, normally man-creature hybrids?  Sometimes goes after normal people?”

“I meant Bucky Barnes.” 

“The Howling Commando?”

Natasha sat back, “You don’t know his codename.”

Darcy grabbed a chip, “I only just found out he was still alive.  Did Steve give him the codename?  Can I guess?  BB for Best Bud.”  She popped the chip in her mouth and reached for her drink.

“He’s the Winter Soldier.”

Darcy choked on her drink.  Coughing and eyes watering she stared at Natasha.  “Holy Shit!”  Natasha however was glaring at the waitress who had come over to check on Darcy. 

Waiting until the waitress left used all of Darcy’s patience, “Steve’s best friend is the Winter Soldier, an assassin so skilled that there are entire communities that exist solely to debate if he exists?  And Patty is trying to track him.”  She covered her face, “She’s gonna get herself killed.” 

“If it helps, I believe he’s fighting his programming.  There aren’t any rumors of him killing anyone since SHIELD fell.”

Through her hands Darcy said, “believe it or not, that doesn’t make me stop worrying about my friends’ potential safety.  I’m definitely going to tell her she needs to get a new hobby ASAP.”

Natasha tapped her on the forearm.  “Before you do that, could you get her to send me her information on where he is?  For a civilian she’s done an impressive job tracking him.”

Darcy’s head was still in her hands, “She’s hacked surprisingly deep into a number of really sensitive satellites.  None of the rest of us are ballsy enough to do it as often as she does.”

“Hmm.”  Natasha tapped her fingers.

“You are not allowed to recruit my friends to whatever organization you’re trying to put together.  They like being in the shadows too much.”

“Fine.” 

“Shit, now I have to go back to work.”  Darcy was almost shaky.  Finding out that Steve was searching out his brainwashed former assassin friend did not help her nerves.  Especially considering she was connected to him, if she was one of the people he called the most (a fact that still surprised and depressed her), it meant that she could be a target if the Winter Soldier tried to lure the good Captain out.  “How am I supposed to deal with people who can’t turn on a computer because they’ve put too much porn on there?”

Natasha shrugged, “I’ve always found a bullet to the kneecap gets a lot of people to change the subject.”

Against her better judgement, Darcy couldn’t help but to snort at the sentiment. 

The rest of the day sucked exactly as much as she thought it would.  Such a big company kept her busy, and while she wasn’t dealing with the porn addicts she was rewiring a ton of stuff.  It all involved getting on her hands and knees to crawl underneath desks and tables, and behind various towers of various tech.  Thank god she had worn pants. 

Getting home, she had a full minute of debate: shower or warning Patty.  Obviously, shower didn’t win.  It took 15 minutes to get everything logged in.  A 15 minutes where Darcy could practically feel the grit and grime of the day permanently settle into her skin. 

Patty wasn’t logged on at the moment, but Darcy put a ping to her account with a note to contact her ASAP.  And then, finally, it was time for a shower.  She took her time, washing her hair twice and scrubbing everything as hard as she could until finally she didn’t feel dusty.  She was rubbing a towel over her head when she heard the notification.

It wasn’t easy to get Patty to turn over her information. She was sure that she was ‘this close’ to proving that the Winter Soldier wasn’t a myth.  When Darcy informed her that she already had proof that he was really, it was clear that Patty was disappointed.  But even then, she had worked hard on tracking him and didn’t want to give up the search.  Darcy had to explain in explicit detail why that was a bad idea. 

By the time Patty was completely convinced, Darcy had just enough time to forward the information to Natasha and drink a single glass of wine before crashing and crashing hard.

Having received the information she needed, Natasha was gone.  She, Steve and apparently Sam were all working together to find Bucky.  Darcy ignored all of that and focused on living her life.

She worked normal hours, went to happy hours with coworkers, helped a few of her friends with their ‘projects,’ and had finally put aside all of SHIELD’s information.  Looking through document after document clearly wasn’t doing anything.  The fact that she had it, and that Natasha knew she had it, was going to have to be enough.  After all, Darcy wasn’t cut out for the superhero life

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise Surprise! Bucky still hasn't shown up. At least he's mentioned? What can I say, I really enjoy a slow-burn.


	8. Steve Is Back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve Is Back!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I'm gonna break it to you. Bucky still isn't here. But he's mentioned in this chapter...
> 
> Can't wait to hear what you think.

It was a couple of months before she heard from either Steve or Natasha again.  A couple of months of living a normal life in the normal world.  There hadn’t been any galas, or fundraisers (at least not ones she had been invited to).  She hadn’t run into any Avengers, or had someone/something threaten her life.  The craziest thing she had done was to confirm plans with Jane.  The conference would be in just a couple of weeks and while Darcy wouldn’t actually be staying at the hotel with Jane, they had made plans to go out for drinks and dancing.  Darcy was already planning on getting Jane drunk enough to go do some Karaoke.  After all, that was the only way to get Jane to do Karaoke, but her voice was perfect for it.  And by perfect for it, Jane couldn’t sing for shit and it always made Darcy cackle to watch her get really into it.  If there was enough alcohol, they might even sing a duet.

But, weeks before that could happen, she got a text from Steve, completely out of the blue, asking for lunch.  After living such a normal life a very tiny part of her was tempted to ignore the text, pretend that she had gotten a new iPhone and lost his number.  But that was a very small part.  The rest of her was excited that he would be back in town.  It had been so long; she had missed his wry humor and watching him mess with everyone's expectations.

She suggested the same place that she and Natasha had gone to all those months before.  The sandwiches were good, and it had kind of become her go to lunch place when she was sick and tired of the office cafeteria. 

Steve had offered to order food if he met her at his apartment.  Darcy mentally shrugged, it seemed a bit strange but she wasn’t one to turn down free food.  Plus she hadn’t been to the residential floors of Avengers Tower since SHIELD fell, and even then she was only in Natasha’s  She would be lying to say she wasn’t deathly curious to find out what Steve had done with this place considering his last apartment was so bare.

They met a few days later.

Steve’s apartment was still fairly bare, but Darcy didn’t have time to focus on that after seeing Steve for the first time in so long.  He pointed her to the table and went to grab the food he had ordered.

Sitting across the table from Steve, and Darcy was shocked.  He was hunched over in a way she hadn’t seen before and still had some bruising on his face.  Either his super-healing wasn’t doing its job or he had been in such a serious fight that the effects still lasted. Given his mission, Darcy was tempted to believe it was the second option.

“Hey stranger.”

He smiled weakly. “Good to see you Darcy.  How is the new job?”

She wiggled a little in mock excitement, “Everything I wished it would be.”  She dropped the wide eyes and abnormal smile and sincerely added, “It’s not perfect but I don’t have to go on dates with strange men to make my rent anymore.”

His smile grew a little more genuine.  “That’s good.”

“But enough about me.  I’m living a normal boring life.  Did you find him?”

He deflated, “Yeah.”  He ran his hand through his hair, “he’s not in such good shape.  We actually found him a while back, but the programming… it made him dangerous.”

“Is that how you got the,” she waved at his face.

There was a weak chuckle, “No, we’ve been taking down Hydra bases in our free time.”

“That definitely sounds like a good ‘free time’ activity.”  Darcy  muttered, but Steve knew her well enough that he talked over all of that.

“The last base had a few, complications?”

“Did you almost die again?”

“No.”  His eyes shifted and he hunched over again.  Darcy grimaced.  But what could you do, there was no way to keep Captain America from finding danger.

“So what has you so down in the dumps, other than another near death experience?”

“It’s Bucky.  He isn’t exactly adjusting well.”

“No shit.” Darcy muttered again.

At this Steve’s head popped up, “This isn’t a laughing matter.”

“Steve, your buddy is one of the most famous assassins in recent years.  Brainwashed or not, it’s gonna be hard to get out of that mindset.  The fact that you thought he would immediately be okay makes me think I should worry about you.”

He leaned back, she had made a logical point. If he hadn’t been so caught up in restoring the past maybe he would have had an easier time with it.  “I can’t give up on him.”

“I’m not saying you should give up on him.  Just recognize he’s probably never going  to be the person you remember him being.”

He sighed heavily, “I do, it’s just,” he ran a hand through his hair again, “I just want some part of him to come back.”

Leaning across the table, Darcy laid a hand on his arm.  It was moments like that where Darcy desperately wished that she had a degree in psychology, or that Steve had a therapist.  How was she supposed to know what to say in a situation this fucked up?

“Thanks,” he replied.  She pulled back her hand, not quite understanding what had helped him, but didn’t want to question it.  “I actually brought you here because I wanted to ask for a favor.”

Oh no.  She didn’t know where this was going, but she had a bad feeling in her stomach. 

“You helped me so much when I came to DC, helped remind me that people could be funny and kind…”

She really didn’t like the direction this was going.

“And you helped me catch up on what was going on in this century; history, slang, tv.”

This was clearly going in a really bad direction.  She tried to break in, but there was no stopping him.

“I actually wanted to see if I could get you to help him adjust?” 

He wanted her to spend time with a reformed assassin to help the guy get caught up on Keeping up with the Kardashians?  What the fuck was going on?  “Steve, I don’t think that…”

“We’ve managed to break most of the conditioning.  The trigger words have all been found and disabled, he’s not dangerous.  He’s just, he’s not adapting to the real world.”

“Steve, it doesn’t sound possible that you could break years of conditioning over a couple of months.”

He looked at his hands.  “Natasha may have had some experience with this…”

Darcy’s mind whirred.  From looking at SHIELD’s information she knew that Hawkeye aka Clint aka that guy who had given her a ride during the kerfuffle in DC, had been taken over by Loki for a period of time, and the official reports made it clear that Natasha was the one who had brought him out.  But, Clint hadn’t been under for all that long, and, from the reports, it didn’t seem like Loki was the kind of person to need trigger words. 

It clicked,  “Natasha had to fight her own programming.” 

Steve seemed relieved that he didn’t have to explain it.  “Once you’ve done something once, it gets easier every time.”  He offered.  “I can pay you again?”

Darcy toyed with her sandwich.  They hadn’t started eating before Steve dropped his bomb, and Darcy had lost her appetite.  “Steve, this is asking a lot.  Can I think about it?”

He shrunk down again.  “Of course.  Sorry to have sprung this on you.  I just, I’m not sure what to do.”

“And I’m sure that’s driving you crazy.  I’m sorry that I can’t be your immediate answer.  I’ll let you know as soon as I can.” 

She left her abandoned sandwich on the table and left to go back to her desk as quickly as possible.  For once she was glad to be dealing with people all day long.  Keeping busy meant that she didn’t have to think about what she should do.


	9. Slow Burns Have Rocky Beginnings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time for Darcy to negotiate her ass off!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is a little later than normal. I ended up working yesterday... and then went to a midnight showing of Rocky Horror. I needed some time to recover. Let me know what you think!

It took a couple of days, but Darcy’s conscience won out.  However, her brain had plenty of input into the matter. 

“Can we talk tonight?”  She texted Steve.  The positive response was immediate. 

Darcy chose a restaurant she knew would be fairly empty, and neutral turf. 

She was already sitting at the table when he arrived five minutes early.  The contract she had written up was in a nice pile in front of her.  There was no point in contacting a lawyer, the situation was too strange to bother.  Instead she had worked through a number of issues and tried to come up with the best solution.

“Darcy?”

“Steve, before we start talking I want you to know that right now we aren’t talking as friends.  We are discussing a contract.  Don’t make it too personal right now.”

He gingerly took the seat across from her.  “What are we doing today, then?

“We’re working out the particulars.  Starting with, if I’m going to do this, you’re paying for me to take self-defense lessons.”

“Could I teach you instead?”  Darcy dug through her bag for a pencil and wrote it in the margins. 

“Sure.  At the beginning, I don’t want to be alone in a room with him.”

“But we’ve broken his conditioning.”

“Steve, I am a short, relatively defenseless person.  If, and I’m not saying this is the case, but if you missed some part of his conditioning, being alone with him puts me in danger.  Until I feel safe, and you can be 100% sure that he’s of no danger, I want you or Natasha or anyone who would be capable of stopping him in the room with me.”

“What about outside the room?”

“Here’s where the discussion comes in.”

And like that they were off.  The contract wasn’t incredibly long.  A few pages at most.  It covered topics from safety issues, to hourly rate, expected hours per week, and whether or not Bucky would see a therapist.

“I told you Steve, I can’t do that.  I’m not trained to, and quite frankly, I don’t think I can handle that baggage alone.”

“I won’t force him to talk to somebody.”

“You’re asking me to play that role, and I can’t.”

“How am I supposed to find someone?”

“You’re part of the Avengers! Do you honestly think that in your whole group of weirdos there’s nobody who’s seeing a therapist? Steve, it’s not shameful now.”

“He’s had his head messed with so many times that I don’t want to…”

She held up a hand, “I’m going to stop you there.  A therapist doesn’t mess with your head. That’s the opposite of their job.  A therapist is meant to help you work through whatever fucked up shit you can’t get out of your head.  You can interview them!  Talk to a couple before you have to make a decision.  I’m not saying this all has to happen immediately.  But I refuse to be his only link to the real world because let’s be honest, your life is nowhere near the definition of normal.” 

That little rant off her chest, Darcy felt better.  But Steve still looked conflicted.  

“Look Steve, I’m not trying to screw you over.  Everything in this,” she patted the contract, “is because I don’t think I will be able to actually help without it.” 

He finally agreed.  The last two points in the contract were hours worked, “I don’t want this interfering with my actual work on the reg.” And what her relationship to Bucky would be, “this is just a friend’s thing, Steve.  If you see him starting to get too attached, you need to shut that down.  I did the whole girlfriend for pay thing once, and no offense, but I’m not really interested in doing that again.”

At that he smiled, “You gotta do what you gotta do to pay your rent, right?”

“Exactly,” she smiled, before finishing making edits to their contract.  “I’m going to rewrite this tonight and I’ll drop off a copy for you to show Bucky tomorrow night.”

 

Bucky had apparently accepted the contract because it had appeared on her desk a few days later after her lunch break.  She hadn’t thought to get Bucky’s number so she texted Steve instead.  “So when are we starting this shindig?”

“Tomorrow night?”

“Sure thing.  What time should we meet?”

“7pm at the entrance of Avengers Tower?  I’ll drive you over.” 

“Okay.”

She finished her day a little after 5 pm and knew she didn’t want to just dick around the office.  Instead she wandered around for a few blocks.  Even having lived in the city for a matter of months, she still enjoyed walking around a few blocks.  Mentally she took note of a few different food places that seem to have just popped up. She missed the 7pm meet time by about 10 minutes and rushed up to Steve, face flushed and just the slightest bit sweaty. 

“Sorry I’m running late, I got a bit distracted.”

He waved her off and got into a cab.  It was a surprisingly long drive away, towards the outer edges of the city.  The buildings had changed, from skyscrapers with restaurants and tiny shops littering the lower levels to boxy buildings that seemed more like warehouses.

“You’re keeping him out here?”

“While we were breaking his programming it seemed safest to keep him away from highly populated areas.”

Darcy saw the taxi drivers eyes open in alarm as he tried to look at the two of them through his rearview window. "Well I guess that explains why I haven't seen too much of you recently."

As they were getting out of the care Darcy leaned into Steve, “Make sure to tip the guy, our conversation made us sound crazy.”  He nodded and threw in a little more extra money.

All the color that could be found in the city looked like it had been leached from the buildings.  They were all similar shades of gray and mostly concrete.  They traveled through a maze of hallways, the sterile lighting even making Steve, as sweet as he was, a little ominous.  Given where they were and what Darcy was being expected to do, it seemed the slightest bit fitting.

Steve stopped outside of a door.  “I’ve already talked to Bucky about it, I’m going to be sitting in the corner.  I’ve brought some music to give you two privacy though.  Didn’t seem right to listen in.”  Darcy nodded.

“That’s a good idea. Wish I had thought of it.”

Steve smiled and pushed open the door.

The room wasn’t nearly as sterile as the rest of the building.  Someone had clearly made the attempt to make it homey, Darcy assumed Natasha given the state of Steve’s apartment, but it was hard to disguise what kind of facility it was.  A plush rug and a paint job couldn’t change the fact that he was being kept away from the rest of society. 

He was laying on the bed, staring up at the ceiling, clearly having ignored or tired of the stacks of books, the puzzle and the newspaper that were all abandoned on the table. 

Darcy was shocked because, well, Barnes didn’t look well.  She didn’t quite know what to expect of someone who was undergoing treatment to undo brainwashing but the sallow shade of his skin and the exhausted expression weren’t quite what she had hoped for. 

“Bucky?”  He started at the name.  It was clear that he hadn’t heard the door open, and Darcy suddenly felt bad about waking him up from a nap.  He looked like he could have slept for a couple of days straight and still have been tired.

“Bucky,”  Steve broke in, having taken in the white knuckles, and tight shoulders.  “This is Darcy.  My friend.  I told you that I was asking her to help out with you a little bit.  Best person I could think of for the job.”

Darcy tried to smile, but was sure it came out badly.  She was in the room with an assassin, an incredibly dangerous person, and was having trouble over-riding her natural fight or flight response.  A response that, by the way, was screaming that she run as fast as she could. 

Steve looked between her and Bucky and went to reach out to Darcy, “Darcy?”

She didn’t stop looking at the danger in front of her, “I’m fine Steve.  Why don’t you put on your music so we can get to know each other?”

He listened and went to sit in the chair placed in the corner of the room where he could still see everything that happened.

Darcy hadn’t moved yet.  “I’m going to be honest.”  She said, watching Bucky’s eyes flicker over her body, taking in her stance.  “You scare the shit out of me.  But I agreed I’m going to help you, and honestly you look like you can use someone who isn’t this kind of batshit insane,” she waved her hands at the facility.  “I’m sure whatever they’re doing is good for you, but… that’s not what I’m here for.  You know what I’m here for.  So, my first question, what do you want me to call you?”

“Steve calls me Bucky.” 

“I know that, but when I said it earlier you flinched like someone had slammed a door while kicking a dog.”

He stared at her, “I don’t think I can be Bucky right now.”

“Then don’t be.  But I need a name to call you.  What do you prefer?”

The silence dragged out.  Darcy shifted from left foot to right foot and back again trying to contain her nerves.

“James.”

She breathed out, and back in deeply.  “Okay, James.  It’s nice to meet you.”

Bucky glanced at Steve and then back at her.  “Why are you really here?”

Darcy rolled her eyes, “You saw the contract, right?  I’m getting paid a decent amount to be here.”

“That’s not all, though.  Is it?”

She huffed out a slight laugh, “You grew up with Steve.  He makes you want to say yes.”

With that he nodded, “Stubborn punk doesn’t know when to give up.  Though he used to have a problem talking to pretty girls.” 

Now that they were on to a safer topic, Darcy moved two steps closer and took a seat at the table.  “Has Steve told you how we met?”

He shook his head.

She looked at the table and grabbed the puzzle.  “Want to help me with this while I tell you?”

“Sure.”

They sat on opposite sides of the table, Darcy’s heart still pounding in fear, but Darcy tried to focus on sorting pieces while she explained that it was an internet match.  That they had only ever been doing it so that Steve wouldn’t be accosted.  That any time she had joked about him making a move he would start to stutter and blush.

That fact had James smiling. 

At the end of the story, Darcy segued into explaining how she had gotten a job in New York, conveniently leaving out the part where she had pulled all of the information from SHIELD.  After all, he didn’t need to know how much she knew about his past.

The silence after she stopped talking lasted for just a moment or two, before Steve got up and took off his headphones.  “That’s been an hour, and Darcy needs to be getting back home.”

Darcy took a quick glance at the books on the table.  There were a bunch of fairly dry history textbooks, the kind that you would find in any public high school in the 1970’s.  “Next time I’ll bring you some decent things to read.  Also, could I get your number?”

Bucky tilted his head, “What would my id number get you?”

Darcy whirled on Steve, “You haven’t gotten him a cell phone yet?”

“None of us were sure if he should have access to a phone right now. Hydra is still active.”

“For fucks sake.  You could get him one of the phones they design for children at least.  The kinds where you can program four phone numbers in there and that’s all he can call.  How is he supposed to get in contact with someone if something goes wrong?” 

Steve was looking at her as if she was missing something obvious.  “There’s always someone watching here.”

Of course, they would still have him under observation.  “Fine.  Just, fine.”  She turned back to James, “It was nice to meet you James.  I’ll come out sometime in the next week or so.  Like I said, I’ll bring some decent things to read and maybe bring another puzzle?”

“Would you mind bringing something else?  Puzzles have never been my favorite”

“Sure, I’ll come up with something to keep our hands busy.” Darcy smiled and walked through the door that Steve was holding open. 

He had somehow gotten another taxi out there to pick them up and once in Darcy finally let herself shake. 

Steve slid in next to her and saw her shaking hands, “Are you okay?”

Staring at her hands, she willed them to stop moving and slowly took control over them again, “I’m fine, just a bit nervous.  I’ve seen what he can do.”

The rest of the drive home was silent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He's finally here! Hope you enjoyed poor broken, mistrusting Bucky (sorry, I meant James) showing up.


	10. What goes around comes around

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy honors her contract...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well at least one of you guessed correctly about what she brought (I mean come on, there's nothing better). 
> 
> I hope you don't mind the early delivery. I'm doing a 24 hour readathon and figured you'd rather a day early than a day late...
> 
> Let me know what you think!

Still, despite any misgivings, Darcy honored the contract.  The day after she met James for the first time she talked to Steve about self-defense.  Mostly, she just wanted to know if his offer to teach her was still on the table.  The answer was a fairly emphatic yes.  Steve’s “If I do it, I’ll know that you’ve been taught well,” made Darcy want to roll her eyes but hey she wasn’t turning down a free self-defense class. 

Her one caveat was that she didn’t want it done on Avengers property.  Nothing in Avengers Tower.  Even if the gym was only a few floors away from where she worked.  Her reasoning was simple: she didn’t want it to look like she was getting special treatment because she knew an Avenger.  She was doing well at work and didn’t want anyone to think she had gotten there just because she was buddy-buddy with the owner of the company.

Steve gave in and found a little gym about a mile away.  Unfortunately, that meant that training started just outside the building.  Training started with a nice mile long run. 

Darcy wished that she had given in and just learned in the tower.

Still, training was kind of great.  Natasha would stop in every now and again to critique Steve’s training process.  “Steve, Darcy can’t just use brute force to get what she wants.”

“I did this all the time when I weighed 95 pounds.”

“Yes, and how many of those fights did you win?”

Their bickering often gave Darcy valuable and needed time to bend over and try to get her heart to stop pounding.

So her schedule became, every Monday she would join Steve on a run and then get trained until she couldn’t hold her arms up, or that she could barely take another step.  Let’s just say that Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Darcy did not take the stairs at work (not that she ever took the stairs at work, but on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday she had an excuse!).

Wednesday and Fridays were her days to visit James.  At least that’s what was written in the contract.  Once James was out of the facility, Darcy was sure those dates and times would change.  But for as long as he had mandatory meetings and whatnot she kept to the schedule.

Tuesday after work she took a short trip.  She needed to pick up some materials for her next meeting with James.  The first one hadn’t gone badly but Darcy wanted the next one to go well.  This was a person she would ostensibly be spending a lot of time with and everything would go just a little bit smoother if they liked each other.  She was sure that if worse came to worse they would both just pretend to keep Steve happy. 

Even if he didn’t seem wholly put together, it was clear that James wanted some sort of approval from Steve.

It was clear that it wouldn’t be hard for him to get. At least that was clear from the outside of their relationship.

Still, Darcy went shopping and had about as much fun shopping as she had ever had (not counting when she picked out her computer.  What could she say, girl had a thing for pretty computers).  And after her shopping trip she went spend some quality time with her computer. 

The next day, back at the facility/warehouse, she proudly presented James with a few items.  He looked at the box she put on the table and ignored it for what she held in her hand.

“What is it?”

“Did hydra not give a shit about music?  It’s an iPod.”  She saw the way he flinched at the mention of hydra and took a mental note.  ‘Don’t say stupid things about the guys who kidnapped, tortured and brainwashed him, dumbass.’ 

He gingerly took it.  “Okay, look,”  She stepped around to his other side so that she could work it.  “It’s a bit old school, but fairly heavy duty.  You can drop this thing and like a Nokia phone it’ll come out fine.”  He stopped staring at the iPod and stared at her instead.  “Right, gotta ease you into references.  It holds music.”

“Like a record?”

Not the smoothest analogy, but she’d take it.  “Sure, it’s a record and a record player all at the same time.  Here, I brought you headphones too.”  She turned back to her bag and rifled through until she pulled out a pair of brand new headphones. 

She walked him through using it and he seemed surprised by some of the options on there, “You actually put Sinatra on this?”

“I had fun shopping yesterday.  What can I say? What I didn’t find in hard copy I bought off the internet.  I tried to get some music from all the ages, although there’s a lot of current top 40’s.  My own Itunes playlists might feature heavily.”

“Thank you.”  He says still staring down at it.

“No big, James.  I figured if you’re stuck in this room for hours on end, having an escape would be nice.”

He looked up and made sure they had eye contact before saying, “Don’t pretend this is a minor favor.  This took time and energy and I appreciate it.”

She couldn’t help the blush that took over her face.  Normally when she did something like this and waved it away people accepted that and moved on.  She realized she was staring and broke off.  “You’re welcome.” 

He nodded and went back to scrolling, “Who’s Ke… how do you pronounce this?”

“That’ll be Ke$ha.  I would leave that until after you’ve worked through the decades playlists that I made for you.  Might be a bit of a punch to the face otherwise.”

“Getting punched in the face isn’t the worst thing that can happen, but I will follow your directions.”

Oh shit, how was she supposed to react to that?  She held up a finger, “I’m gonna go ahead and ask because god knows I don’t want to step on any toes, was that a joke?”

He smirked, “Maybe?”

She shook her head, “I should have figured you’d be a bit of a shit.  I feel like it’s required of anybody who can stand Steve for very long.”

His face fell back into it’s neutral expression.  Clearly she had said something wrong.  “Dude, you gotta tell me when I fuck up.  This, ‘I could kill you with my pinky’ face is probably doing exactly what you want it to do because it’s scary as fuck.” 

At that his face went from neutral to slightly pissed off.  It wouldn’t seem like that was an improvement… and yet.  Honestly, it meant that Darcy was slightly more aware of the strength hidden under the otherwise bland clothing.

And that was NOT a route she could continue to let herself think in.  The man had been brainwashed and tortured, and didn’t need her incompetent ass to become a problem.  “So, what did I do?”

“You called me feces.”

“Oh my… Sorry that’s me being stupid.  It’s become the internet’s weirdest term of endearment?  In this case the implication is that Steve can be a sassy son of a bitch and you need the same temperament to cope.”

He nodded at that.  “Punk.”

Darcy’s eyes lit up, “Exactly!  So, on to the other goodies.”  She sat down and pushed the box to him, smiling all the while. 

He cautiously reached forward to open the box.  Inside were two sections, one containing another box, and a pile of books.  He grabbed the books first, not ready for a new reveal of things he might not understand. He flipped through them and Darcy explained, “Textbooks aren’t really the right way to learn history, they impart information but there are so many better avenues.  These still might be a bit dry but I wanted to cover at least some of the more important historical events.”  He smiled slightly at the books.

Reading had never exactly been his forte but given his current states it’s not like he had any real hobbies to fall back on.

“And now, for the best thing I brought!”  Darcy stood up and pulled the other box out, opened it and dumped the contents on the table.    Blocks came tumbling out.  All different colors, and slightly different sizes.  “They’re legos!”

Bucky continued to stare at the pile of stuff on the table.  “What do you do with them?”

“You build.”  Darcy sat back down and started to fit some pieces together.  Bucky warily sat down across from her and grabbed two pieces. 

“But what’s the point?”

Darcy stopped putting blocks together, “Fun?”  She waited a pause, “I thought the puzzle was good because it kept our hands busy which made it easier to talk.  Same idea here.” 

Hesitantly he put the two pieces together.  “What do I make?”

“Whatever you want.  If you’d rather, next time I can bring the kind that has instructions.  I just figured…”

“No, this should be okay.”

He continued to put pieces together.  Darcy smiled, even if he was humoring her, she appreciated his willingness to try.  “So, let me tell you about my internship senior year of college.  I applied with this astrophysicist out in the middle of nowhere…”

 

Her next visit she brought cupcakes.  Not cupcakes that she had made, she was pretty bad at cooking.  She had a few basics mastered: ramen, mac&cheese but only the kind from a box, grilled cheese sandwiches and oddly enough, meatballs.  Really, anything that either came with their own instructions, or anything that was basically impossible to screw up. 

Baking was a bit beyond her.  But, living in New York City, there was an amazing restaurant, bakery, café, donut shop, bagel place, pizza place (and the list goes on) just around the corner.  And luckily, there were many corners near work. 

So, she picked up a dozen cupcakes.  Standing at the counter she had debated with herself.  A dozen did seem like a few too many, but given the number of cupcakes that Steve could pack away, and Natasha when she was willing to let loose.  Darcy figured it would be better to have too many rather than too few. 

Steve reached for one in the taxi, but Darcy swatted at his hands.  “Hey, these are for James.  If you want a cupcake, you’ll have to ask him for one.”

Steve looked at her askance, “James?”

“He asked me that to call him.  Now are you going to risk my wrath by trying, and failing to take a cupcake again?”  She casually pulled her taser out of her purse.  At this point, they both knew that she wouldn’t use it on him.  They both knew that the taser probably wouldn’t work on him even if she did use it.  But it made her point fairly well, she was taking no prisoners. 

“Fine, I’ll ask Bucky.”

She smiled, the smile of someone who had won a minor and mostly worthless argument but knew that it wasn’t that argument that mattered, but the fact that she won! 

They walked into the room and before Steve had a chance to put on his headphones Darcy announced.  “James, I brought you cupcakes and sore loser back there is dying to have one.  What’s your judgement?”

Bucky looked a little confused.  “Why can’t he have a cupcake?”

“They’re yours.  It’s your choice if he gets one.”  At that, he looked at Steve and a tiny smile started to curl one side of his face. 

“So, if I decide to eat all of them in one sitting…” 

Darcy looked between the two men.  “That’s your choice and we’ll honor it?”

Steve’s face was telling a different story.  “C’mon Buck.  That was one time.  Mrs. O’Shenigan made those cookies for my birthday and I was already sick and…”

Bucky started laughing.  “Of course the punk can have one.  Not like I can eat a full dozen by myself.”

Steve frowned a little, but it was clear that he was putting on a face.  The glimmer in his eye made it clear that he was just glad that Bucky was in a joking mood. 

He went to grab a cupcake and go back to his seat, but Bucky grabbed his arm.  “Why don’t you join us while you eat that?”

While the whole point of Darcy getting to know Bucky was so that she could be a “life coach,” she did like the idea of getting to know James around other people.  Not that Steve hadn’t been there.  But around other people, where everyone can be part of the conversation.

Steve turned to her, and she shrugged.  For the time being, Steve was still paying her to be there, so it didn’t seem like her decision to make.

“Sure,”  Steve joined him at the table.  It was strangely more stilted than her conversations with James normally were.  The problem was the Steve would try to reference something from ‘back in the day’ and when James didn’t remember he would shut down.  Not a full on shut down, but slip into the neutral mode that he had. 

It was eerie to see.  His face would go blank, and his posture would change from whatever dynamic pose he had been in to what seemed like a parade rest.  Arms would hand down at his side, and he would sit back like he was preparing to react to anything that came his way. 

He didn’t go straight into it every time, but he slowly moved back into position over the course of the conversation. 

At the point where Steve had finished his cupcake and seemed like he was ready to jump over the table to jog Bucky’s memory, Darcy laid a hand on his arm.  “Hey Steve, I have something I need to talk to James about.” And she nodded to the corner.  His shoulders dropped, but he acquiesced. 

Darcy waited until the headphones were on before turning back to Bucky.  “Are you okay?”

He was still in his eerie neutral mode.  There was no response. 

She needed a way to get through to him, though it didn’t seem like gentle would be the way to go.  Still, she had to try that first.  There was no point in going straight to the nuclear option.

“James,” she tried again, when she shifted her hand across the table, his eyes followed it before tracking up somewhere in the distance.  “James, I’m going to lean over and touch your arm.”  Reaching across the table, she hesitated.  She knew that one of his arms was metal and wasn’t sure if it still had feeling.  She reached for the human arm first.  Laying her hand on him didn’t seem to do anything.  She reached for the other arm and he flinched before she could make contact.

“Okay, I won’t touch your metal arm.”  She breathed in.  Clearly none of this was setting off any of Steve’s alarms as neither he nor any of the faceless people working here seemed to worry about the fugue state. 

She wracked her brain for something to do.  Smooshing a cupcake in his face clearly was a bad idea.  She decided to talk, talk about what she knew.  “So I had this professor that had the biggest thing for Steve back in Freshman year.  Doesn’t matter what we were supposed to be studying, somehow he would bring it back to you guys.  To the Howling Commandos.  One of my favorite stories is… we were supposed to be looking at how Nuclear Deterrents are supposed to work in the modern world, basically showing off the prisoners dilemma.  If you don’t know what that is you can ask me later.  But we were talking about nuclear deterrents, and the guy started to talk about how Steve was the nuclear deterrent for the US against the Nazis in WWII.  The example he used was actually when…”  as she kept telling the story, even the parts where she was talking about the campaigns the Howling Commandos used to run, she could see him start to soften. 

There was no one big thing that gave away that Bucky was present again.  His posture became more natural, his eyes stopped seeing something in the distance and instead focused on her, and finally, finally he huffed.  It wasn’t quite a laugh.  Really, just a harsh exhalation.  But Darcy would take it.

“Back with me, James?”

He nodded slowly. 

“Do you want me to keep talking?” 

There was a brief pause, and then he nodded again.

In the ride home Darcy had a few questions for Steve.  “Does he always shut down like that?”

He sighed, “Yes and no.”

“That’s not an answer.”

He winced, “He used to get a bit violent when we tried to get him to remember his past.  When tested he hasn’t gotten violent in quite a while,” he said quickly, like ripping off a Band-Aid.  But like ripping off a Band-Aid, hearing that fucking hurt.

“How long ago was he still getting violent Steve?”

“A month and a half?”

Darcy dug the heel of her hands into her eyes.  “He’s been stable for a month and a half, without seeing a therapist, and you let a civilian in there?”

“We have a number of security measures….”

“I don’t care about your security measures Steve,” she threw her hands out as far as the car would allow, her fingers made fairly hard contact with the window but she bit down on a flinch.  “I know you were reckless back in the war but you can’t be reckless about it now.  He’s in no physical danger.  You can’t rush this stuff…. But” she breathed in sharply.  “That’s not what this is about.  How often is that fugue state triggered?”

He stayed silent, fidgeting every now and again.  Darcy let the silence lie until it became more than a lack of sound but a tension between them. 

“It happens every time I try to get him to remember something.”

Darcy almost wanted to rip the hair out her head.  “Steve, if that’s what’s causing the fugue states maybe stop doing it?”

“But he remembers.  I know he does.  He remembers my mother’s name, and that we had to pack our shoes with newspapers….”

“So he remembers some stuff, but you forcing the rest of it clearly isn’t helping.  It took 20 minutes for him to come out of that.” 

Darcy stared out the window, and almost missed Steve’s “What did you say to him to break him out.”

“I told him stories.” She said begrudgingly.  For some reason didn’t want to tell him what had happened and she wasn’t sure why.

“What kind of stories?”

“About you and the Howling Commandos.”

“And that didn’t cause problems?”

“Steve, the difference is that I’m telling him stories, you’re trying to get him to remember.  He isn’t that person now.  There’s a chance he could get some of his old habits back, but he’s a different person now. You can’t expect he’ll be the same as he was.”

The rest of the trip was silent.  When they stopped at Avengers tower, Steve quietly said, “If you’re right, I think it might be a good idea for Natasha to be the one to go with you.”


	11. Get Whatcha Need

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, this chapter has one of my favorite scenes in it... Also there's quite a bit of fluffy stuff. I love sharing the character dynamics and I feel like this chapter has some good ones. ]
> 
> Happy almost Halloween!

Natasha did take over room sitting duties.  Steve had seemed a little hurt that Darcy had kicked him out at least temporarily.  Time passed surprisingly quickly.  Between work being busy, going to see James once or twice a week, her training, and trying to sneak in time with Steve or her other friends months flew without much  notice.

Natasha sitting in on sessions was interesting as there were these tiny moments that made it seem like there was a history between the two of them.  Nothing major but a stiffening of form before relaxing, a tight nod that seemed almost unintentional.  But both James and Natasha seemed to think it was a nonissue.  Darcy wasn’t going to stick her nose where it was needed, so she just stayed out of it. 

The best thing about having Natasha around was that she could read a room really well. When she first showed up she would sit in her corner with a book or some headphones.  As time went on and James started to relax, and the fugue states started to decrease, Natasha joined them more.  The three would sit there, in Bucky’s sad, stark room and talk about their most ridiculous days.  Or, in Bucky’s case, the most ridiculous day they could remember.  Which to be fair, might have also been true for Darcy.

“Jane and I had so much tequila that night, all I know is that we went to sing karaoke and the next morning we had somehow acquired a monkey and were banned from two of the five bars in the town.  We had to go a whole 50 miles out the next time we wanted to go out because Jane was so embarrassed.  Lady doesn’t mind everyone thinking she’s crazy because she believes in aliens before that was common knowledge but was too embarrassed to show her face in town a week later.”

That had Natasha and Bucky both laughing into their drinks. 

“This one time, I remember DumDum had done something to piss us off.  I can’t remember what but I remember the entirety of the Commandos just being completely pissed.  Of course, at this point we had all known each other for an eternity, so we knew what his favorite meals were.  One night Steve and I went into everyone’s bags and switched out all of the food.  Made sure that DumDum was carrying all of the heaviest stuff, and of course only stuff that he loathed.  We hid all the good stuff in our packs underneath all the shit we had to carry.  Next breakfast when the coffee was missing, he was pretty irritated, but kind of understood.  When lunch ended up just being a can of spam with a fork in it he about shit himself, and when after lunch he went to grab for his smokes and ended up with one of those candy cigarettes he damn near lost it.”

“The best part of the story.”  And he paused here, to keep from giggling, “the best part of the story is when he gathered us all around and asked which of us sorry sons of bitches did this, Steve said,”  he had to pause again, “Steve said, well I just don’t know what you’re talking about.”

As a punchline, it wasn’t amazing, but the enthusiasm the story was told with made up for a lot.  Darcy and Natasha were both leaning into each other giggling

Darcy and Natasha had now been out to visit for more than a few months of Wednesday’s and Friday’s. In the most recent month Darcy had only seen one fugue state, although she heard there had been a few others. But only a few.

At the end of the session, Darcy and Natasha got up. “I’ll see you next week, James.”

“I’m actually, I’m being moved into an apartment.  I think next Friday.  Would it be okay to cancel this Wednesday and have you meet me on Saturday instead?”

Darcy thought through her schedule.  It would still be another three weeks before Jane was in town.  And all she really had scheduled was a happy hour or two and her self-defense class.  “Sure, let’s do Saturday.  Text me your new address?”

He grinned, “Sure thing, and, would you bring Steve?  I get the feeling he’s being a bit mopey.”

Boy was he right about that.  At the point where he realized that he was setting back Bucky’s recovery, the man had basically packed up his emotions and left the building.  Darcy still tried to hang out with him, but he was hyper-focused on whatever mission the Avengers were doing, and spent most of his other time at the gym.

Darcy tried to talk to him while he was teaching her self-defense but he was hyper focused on that too, trying to shut down the small talk.  Even asking him what stupid thing someone had said during the last mission didn’t get him started the way it normally did.

“Of course, James.  I’ll talk to him.  He misses you.”

“I didn’t ask the punk to leave?”  He was getting a bit defensive, as if Darcy blamed him for the fact that Steve wasn’t showing up anymore.  Darcy didn’t really feel like explaining that it was her fault that Steve was in the midst of a cold front in the game of hot and cold.

“And he knows that.  Trust me, he’s gonna show up.”

 

When she told Steve that ‘James’ had asked for him personally he immediately lit up.  And then dimmed.  “Are you sure he’s asking because he wanted me to come?”

“Steve, the man is getting an apartment.  This is pretty much his housewarming party, and regardless of the last month or two, you are still his best friend.  Of course he wants your support.”  His smile grew again.  He even offered to pick her up.

On Saturday, she looked at the address, and then at Steve, and then at the building outside.  “Where exactly is his money coming from?” 

The building looked amazing.  It was old and grand looking.  The exterior had aged in the same way that so many European landmarks had aged.  It was obvious the building was ancient as all get out, but that someone had taken the care and attention to make sure that the foundation remained stable and that brick had been renovated to keep the building stunning.  Even more than that the place looked like a fucking castle. 

Steve stared at the building.  Darcy had seen his place in DC, she knew he hadn’t exactly been looking for the cream of the crop when his living situation was concerned. 

“Uh, I think some of it is military backpay, and I think some of it is hazard pay from Stark’s emergency fund.”

“Well, I kind of want to get a chunk of that change because god damn.”  It clicked, some of the money was coming from Stark, “Have you talked to Tony yet about the super-secret thing that was uncovered in SHIELD’s demise that somehow he missed?”

Pointedly still staring at the building, Steve said, “Whatever do you mean?”

“You’re a shitty liar Steve Rogers.  Before this gets too far you need to let Tony know about the history between his parents and James.  If you respect him or care for him at all.  Either of them, really.”

Steve sighed, “I just don’t want Bucky to be judged by something that he wasn’t in his full power to do.”

“I get that Steve, but come on, if Tony is paying for all of this,” she waved at the opulent building, “he has a right to know.  You know how he is, it’ll come up some way or another.  Seems like the man doesn’t know when to leave something alone.”

Steve gave a derisive chuckle, “You got that right.”

“So fucking talk to him already.”  Darcy said, getting out of the car. Steve said nothing about the profanity, which to be fair he really only did to get on her nerves.  It meant he was actually thinking about what she had said. 

They made their way inside, signed in at the front desk and got into the old school elevator.  “If we get stuck I’m eating you before you eat me.”  Darcy muttered under her breath, damn well knowing that Steve could hear every word.  The elevator creaked and crawled its way up, but thankfully didn't get stuck, instead opening to a cramped hallway with plenty of blank space between the generic doors.

They knocked on the door and James answered.  Darcy was floored.  She was floored for two very conflicting reasons.

The first, the place was gorgeous.  The windows weren’t huge, but there were mirrors set up to take advantage of all of the light that was being brought in.  There was a fireplace that Darcy could already imagine building up and curling up in front of with her computer, saving nations and wrestling bears (okay, she may have read a few too many fantasy and romance novels growing up, before she realized that those stories were too unrealistic and decided to stop reading them, sue her, girl had fantasties).  The view outside the window was amazing.  The apartment would have been perfect except that James clearly shared Steve’s sense of decorating.

There was almost nothing in the place.  For all of the gorgeous views and the mirrors that captured so much light and a ceiling that looked like it was made for an elegant chandelier, all James seemed to own was a card table, a single chair, and a bookshelf with a few of the books that Darcy had bought for him. 

She shoved a gift bag at James and said, “I don’t care what your plans were for the day, we’re going furniture shopping.  This is ridiculous.”

He went to peek into the bag and Darcy smacked at his fingers.  “Nope, that’s for after you have an actual home and not just a place you happen to live in.”  Steve was smiling like he was used to Bucky getting a talking to.  “Steve, you’re going shopping too.  I don’t care if you’re living in the tower.  I’ve seen your idea of decorating and it’s not much better than this.”

He grimaced and looked vaguely like a little boy who just found out they were going to the doctor instead of going to laser tag. 

She called an uber and shuffled the boys to the lobby.  Once they were in the car she covertly texted Natasha to join them.  After seeing Natasha’s apartment she was sure that she could use the help to bring the boys into the modern century where a well-dressed apartment was a fairly normal occurrence. 

They started out at the mattress story because Darcy was sure that James wouldn’t treat himself to a decent mattress.  She took a running jump at one of the first ones she saw.  Allowing herself to roll for just a minute, she ended up laying on her back with her hair halo’d around her.  “If I hadn’t just bought a new mattress.”  She bemoaned. 

Both men were staring at her, though she wrote it off as them being stunned at her childlike behavior.  “Just be happy I’m not jumping on all the beds.  Got in trouble at a few foster homes for that.”  She pushed herself off the mattress and watched as both James and Steve wandered around the store, looking at the mattresses as if they would bite.  She rolled her eyes and went to test a few more. 

At the point where she got bored, she looked up again to see both men at the cheaper end of the store, trying out a mattress that looked like it was made of cardboard.  She stepped over there, knowing she was going to have to play the fairy of wisdom for men who were so full of guilt that it couldn’t be contained in their bodies and overflowed to infect anyone near them (just ask her, the other day she felt bad about taking the last chocolate donut on donut Wednesday and actually apologized to creepy Paul about it). 

“Why are you guys looking at the saddest mattress in the store?”  There was no answer.  She pulled James into a quiet corner.  “I know you still feel guilty for everything that the Winter Soldier did.”  He winced and started to shut down, she pulled at his arm, “but you don’t have to live like you’re punishing yourself.  You can treat yourself to a good nights sleep, or a comfortable couch, or a tv that’s larger than any tv has a right to be.  You should ask to visit Natasha’s place at some point.  If anyone can convince you that who you were isn’t who you are, it would be her.  But for now, go buy yourself a comfortable fucking mattress.”

He nodded, still not completely relaxed and Darcy considered it as much of a win as she could have during that particular conversation.  Until, Steve decided to add his own two cents, “Bucky, that wasn’t you doing all of those things…”

Darcy broke in, “Don’t get me started on your and denial of creature comforts.  I know what you used to sleep on and my crappy $50 craigslist futon was nicer than that.  You’re getting yourself a new mattress too.”  She missed the look that James sent her way before he started just as strangely at Steve.

“I already have one.  Tony had the apartment set up for me.”

Bucky snorted, “And what complaint did you have about it?”  He asked, like he had spent hours hearing Steve complain about it.

Steve glared at his friend and mumbled, “It’s too soft.”

Ugh, “Buy a fucking mattress Steve.” 

That, in some ways, set the tone for the rest of the day.  Natasha hadn’t answered until well after the mattress store.  The store where Darcy had bullied two indecently attractive WWII soldiers into buying brand new mattresses.  Luckily after her little ‘talking down’ of the guys they had shaped up and done their own testing of mattresses.  Bucky got a memory foam that he quite literally sunk into (Darcy was sure there were deep dark reasons that he went for the softest thing he could find but didn’t want to think of that when the picture of a blissed out James laying on a mattress was so much better) and Steve went for something fairly firm.

Natasha did, however, meet them at an Ikea.  She walked in, looked around, scoffed and practically dragged the guys out.  She gave them her own version of a ‘don’t live like your punishing yourself speech’ which boiled down to a harsh look and a “don’t be stupid, get nice stuff.”

She took Steve under her wing at the fancy boutique that she made them go too.  She pulled a notebook out from nowhere and started writing down codes of things she thought Steve needed. 

It made Darcy feel woefully unprepared.  She grabbed a sheet of paper and a pen from her bag and handed it to James so that he could note what he liked.  After that she was pretty happy to follow him around the store.

At least until he stopped in front of the worlds most uncomfortable looking sofa.  “Dear god, James.  Why do you gravitate to things that look like they could break your back if they’re sat in for more than half hour increments?”

“It’s a sofa.  And it doesn’t look uncomfortable.”

“The edges look like you could cut a cheese board with it… And considering I’m probably gonna spend a decent amount of time on your couch, I’d prefer it be comfortable.”

He stopped and looked at her, his expression almost the same as when he heard that Darcy had slept in Steve’s bed.  “Then you choose it.” 

Darcy thought the proposal through and grinned wickedly.  “James Barnes, you are going to end up with the squishiest, most comfortable couch that you possibly could.  And I’m gonna try as hard as I can to make it hot pink.”  She immediately went to the only hot pink couch in the store, and bounced on (the incredibly stiff) pillows before grinning wildly at him.  The blanching of his face was totally worth the sore ass.

Of course, once she got past messing with him, she very seriously tried every sofa in the store, ignoring the rest of his wanderings around the store.  At the end she pointed out two options, a sectional that came in a variety of colors, and a traditional couch that doubled as a pull out.  He looked at both and wrote a number on the paper with everything else. 

Darcy let Natasha handle getting everything checked out.  There wasn’t much that they were taking home with them on day one, most of what they bought would be delivered a few days later, but Darcy considered the trip a success.  Though when she saw the total amount of money they were spending she almost wanted to throw up.  Even with the additional income from working with James, the idea of spending that much money in one go was painful. 

She was happy with her hodge-podge apartment.  Natasha might not like Ikea, but it sure as shit worked for Darcy.

 

The Wednesday after they went shopping, Darcy decided that they needed a movie night.  She had grabbed a few of the dvds that she owned and was armed with a Netflix login.  Yes, she had caved and continued to pay for it after the free trial.  She got used to having a libraries worth of television and movies to never get around to watching.  So, DVD’s and a box of microwave popcorn, because there was no way a single bag would be enough. 

Natasha and Steve had been tasked with bringing dinner so Darcy didn’t bother checking with them.  Natasha liked her creature comforts and sometimes that included amazing and probably overpriced food.  Sometimes it meant that dinner was just the most comfort of comfort foods, pizza.

Knocking on the door and entering the apartment made her feel like she was entering an entirely new apartment.  Gone was the sparsely decorated, sad apartment that she had seen on Saturday.  The sectional she had liked was there taking up a good portion of the room, but in a lovely navy blue.  There was a huge, plush rug covering the floor that looked so soft that Darcy almost wanted to drop to the ground to lay on it.  The walls were a completely different color, a creamy beige instead of an institutional white.  And apparently James had opened her housewarming gift because on the glass coffee table, there were plastic flowers that she had given him.  She hadn’t wanted to burden him with real flowers which took so much time and attention.  Somehow the flowers didn’t look cheap or fake, but looked as though they had spontaneously bloomed in that apartment.

There was an elegant bookshelf that held a number of the books she had suggested, that held a number of seemingly useless items, a glass cube, an empty decanter, and some unused candles.  Darcy couldn’t see the small speaker set she had given him but had to assume it was in the oversized cabinet across the room from the sectional. 

Yet, for all that the room looked like it belonged in a magazine spread (turn to page 7 to see all the unattainable homes that you can dream about but never actually aspire to have), it felt cold.  There was no mess, no clutter.  It wasn’t like someone had put everything in it’s place.  It felt more like everything in it had been placed for aesthetic and then never used.

Darcy knew it was her job to make that aura disappear.

So, she bustled in and complimented, “James, everything here is beautiful!”  Before dropping her bag onto the glass coffee table, making sure not to jostle the flowers.  She started pulling out the few dvds that she owned, leaving them on the table, but vowing to leave them on the bookshelf when she left.

James brought over plates to the table that was tucked into the corner, not nearest the window as Darcy would have expected, but off to the side, the corner of the room.  Of course, as befitted the rest of the apartment, the plates were slightly utilitarian and exceedingly modern. 

Darcy almost felt bad that dinner ended up being a couple of pizzas, it was a food that had neither positive nor negative connotations for all three of the damaged super soldiers in the room.  After finding out that apple pie made Steve tear up, and that dumplings made Natasha fall into an eerie silence, Darcy had created a list of foods that were problematic.  Pizza was always a safe choice. 

They ate their pizzas and Darcy joked with Natasha about a happy hour that she had dropped in on.  She had almost literally scared the shit out of a few of Darcy’s coworkers.  In the end, Darcy convinced them that she didn’t actually know Black Widow, this was Natalie Rushman, a model friend she had made at her self-defense class.  Natasha knew how to slip in and out of identities and played it off flawlessly.  The biggest problem was now Brad, one of the other IT guys was pestering Darcy to get her number.

“Brad is still asking about you.”

Natasha smiled smugly, “Everyone asks about me.  I’m an ingénue.”

Darcy snorted into her pizza, “I wouldn’t go that far.  You just like being mysterious.  You say things purely to confuse people.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You’re as bad a liar as Steve, how you could still be a super spy is beyond me.”

Bucky and Steve watched the back and forth, “Natalia knows how to lie when it matters.  I taught her well.”

Well, that was something that hadn’t been in SHIELD’s files. “You knew each other?”

“He trained me.”  Natasha said it in such an offhand matter that for a second Darcy was convinced that she already knew the information.  However, the stunned look on Steve’s face made it clear that this was relatively new information. 

“She was the best, could dance like midnight stalking over the mountaintops.  Drew in any man stupid enough to watch.”  James smiled fondly at her, “didn’t look too bad naked either.”

“At least until you shot me in the stomach.”

Steve snorted at that, “Like I said before, I’m sure you look horrible in a bikini.”

Darcy let the conversation continue.  Clearly, Steve had decided to act like that wasn’t brand new information, and then told some sort of inside joke and she was completely lost.  It was moments like that, that made Darcy realize where she fit into the world.  She wasn’t as good at rolling with the punches as they were, didn’t want to connect what she knew about the Red Room with what she knew about Hydra using James as their tool.  It was too horrible a web to consider.

She shoved the horror she felt in that moment as deep as she could to laugh at whatever sniping James and Natasha were doing to each other.

“Okay, okay.”  She pushed their hands down.  Natasha seemed to bring out some of James’ lightheartedness but that didn’t mean they needed to act like children.  “Movie time.  I brought a few classics; a couple of Disney movies and a League of Their Own.  I told Steve he needed to watch it at some point and he had baldly ignored my good advice.”

Natasha chuckled, “since when does Steve take anybody’s good advice.”

“Point.” Darcy nodded, “But now he doesn’t have an option.  Everyone gets a vote except for Steve.”

In the end Darcy was still outnumbered, the final tally was 2.5 for Snow White (she decided Steve could get half a vote) and only 1 for a League of Their Own. 

“Where’s the DVD player?”  Bucky pulled a remote from underneath the coffee table and suddenly the entertainment center started moving, the doors opening remotely.  And there was the tiny speaker system that she had given him.  Hiding a smile, she went to the kitchen to prepare the popcorn.  She brought out two bags and handed them around. 

James smelled it and jolted.  “What is this?”

“Popcorn.”  Darcy stated, grabbing a handful and dropping a few kernels in her mouth. 

“This is not popcorn.”  James held out the bag to Steve, who took a single piece and put it in his mouth before gagging.

“That’s horrible.”  He looked disturbed, staring at the bag.  “That is not popcorn.”  He and James looked at each other.

“Where’s the nearest bodega?”  Steve asked.

“Around the corner.  Who’s coming?  We’re going to fix you two real popcorn.  Not whatever this shit is.”

Darcy shrugged and pushed herself off the couch, she still had a few bags hidden away so if whatever they made was bad, she still had a backup.  Meanwhile, Natasha leaned back on the couch and made herself comfortable. 

“Why don’t you go without me?  I’m pretty happy here.  This sofa is almost as comfortable as mine.”

“Not quite there yet, hasn’t been broken in yet.”   Darcy grinned at her.

"I've always said a sofa isn't truly broken in until you've had sex on it”  Natasha smirked.

Darcy giggled, “Nice picture, but not at all what I was going for.”

“Don’t christen my sofa.  It’s brand new.”  James chastised before he and Darcy left Steve and Natasha alone.

They walked the short block and Darcy realized it was the first time she had ever truly been alone with James.  At least as alone as the New York City streets would allow.  Even in the early evening there were plenty of people around. 

“Think there’s something going on there?”  Darcy asked, honestly wanting James’ opinion.  He might not be up to date with pop culture, but between his years being Steve’s friend, and his years working slightly undercover she trusted him to be able to read people and situations. 

He shrugged, though only the one shoulder actually moved.  The metal shoulder, for whatever reason didn’t react.  “Not yet.”

“Natasha is pretty blatant, though.  And with your history…”  Darcy trailed off.

That, oddly enough, got James to laugh.  “From what I remember, Steve is pretty oblivious.  And my history with Natalia is… checkered.”  He dropped it at that, which was a tantalizingly vague statement.  Yet, the conversation and the reminder of his past seemed to weigh on him in a way that it hadn’t at dinner. 

The rest of the walk was quiet and the slightest bit tense. 

At the bodega they picked up popcorn kernels, butter, salt and pepper.  They paid way too much but Bucky simply held out a card and signed his name, walking away with the plastic bag in his hand. 

On the way home, Darcy was hovering.  She couldn’t decide if she wanted to stand close to him, provide a little human comfort from dark memories, or walk further away to avoid any of his wrath should her revert.  It was a fine line and Darcy didn’t want to cross either end.

Back in the apartment, James came back to himself.  He hummed slightly as he pulled a pot out and poured some oil in.  He stovetop cooked the popcorn and sprinkled a fair amount of melted butter, salt and pepper on it.  He poured the whole pot into two large bowls and passed them out. 

Steve popped some in his mouth and smiled, “Just like your mom used to make.”

James smiled, and handed the bowl to Darcy.  She took one bite and made a face.  “You guys can keep that, I’m going to stick with my artery clogging, heart attack popcorn, thank you.” 

They bickered a little bit over the various styles of popcorn but Steve and James were happy to eat the homemade while Darcy dove into her microwave popcorn and Natasha went between the two. 

Snow White started and about 15 minutes in, James said, “I think, I think I’ve seen this before?”

Steve chuckled, “You would remember, I think I made you see this 4 times, maybe 5 times?  It only cost a nickel to see a show.”

“A nickel we could have spent on dinner.”  Grumbled James. 

Steve and James sniped at each other throughout the movie.  Steve talked enough that Natasha may or may not have thrown a pillow at him (no one was willing to confirm) because he was as in awe of the animation as he had been the first time he saw it.

When the movie was over, Darcy helped clean up plates and the various detritus they had left.  In a moment where no one was looking, she slipped a few dvd’s onto the bookshelf and tried to leave just a little bit of stuff around.  Not enough to make a mess, but enough that the apartment looked lived in as opposed to a model that looks pretty but serves no function.

She waved goodbye, and headed home.  Back at her cozy and relatively poorly decorated apartment, she pulled up her computer to look at the state of her student loans. Between the job she had that paid pretty nicely for being an IT grunt and all of the time she was being paid to spend with James, her student loans had never looked less terrifying. 

But looking at the remaining numbers, Darcy had to ask herself if it was worth it.

She didn’t exactly fit in their world, even if she had done a good job faking it.  She was out of her depth and no one seemed to notice.  All three of them had lived these tragic moments, moments that could have broken lesser people.  It was hard to look at her life coming through the foster system mostly unscathed and think that she could be a support for them.  But even more than that, she couldn’t tell if she was actually helping James recover. 

And wasn’t that what was most important thing.  He seemed better at times.  That night, he had joked around with all three of them.  Then, there were his memories.  He was starting to remember things, things he hadn’t been prompted to talk about.

Steve’s face, Darcy thought about the happiness that Steve couldn’t hide. 

There was no easy answer.  Darcy closed her laptop, she may have felt guilty about taking money for something she was starting to think she would have done willingly anyway.  Nobody was getting hurt, except for possibly her.  If she knew it was coming, at least she could prepare.


	12. Monopoly Breaks Families

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's almost time for Jane to show up... but before that happens, Darcy decides to sharpen her board games skills.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy November. To everyone doing NaNoWriMo, good luck! This story was basically my version on NaNoWriMo from December two years ago. 
> 
> Jane is almost going to show up! Hopefully you're feeling some anticipation.

There was no true escape from the previous nights' revelations.  But that didn't mean she wouldn't try. Darcy spent a good portion of the day texting Jane.  Long story short, she was starting to get as excited as Jane was about the conference.  There was something kind of quaint about being Jane’s intern for one more weekend.  That was the plan after all. 

Darcy would pose as Jane’s intern so that she could attend the conference.  The two of them would have the chance to catch up (Darcy was pretty sure that Thor had made at least one visit after London that Jane still hadn’t given her all the detail on) and boy did Darcy want that with someone who was fairly normal.

Everyone else she knew couldn’t really be considered normal.  At least, everyone she knew with a security clearance.  There was no way that she would ever consider sharing any of what was going on in her life with Brad.  Someone like Brad wasn’t going to understand the intricacy of helping a Russian defector go shopping, or helping two attractive WWII soldiers learn how to use their smartphones (though at this point she was pretty sure that Steve was just humoring her).  Getting back to the point, Darcy was excited that she could talk to someone outside of their little dysfunctional group about her sudden misgivings.

The one thing she was worried about was explaining to Jane how she and Steve had met.  Well, also trying to explain the current situation between her and James.  Basically the entire situation.  The entire situation was off the charts strange.  But, if there was anyone who would understand off-the charts strange it would be Jane.

That was her career after all.  The storm-chasing.  The willingness to believe that there was a man in the storm.  The ability to face down a giant metal destroyer and a herd of elves.  Jane was tough as nails when her science was involved and everything about that science was off-the-charts.

Therefore, in times of trouble, Jane was the lifeline.  Texting Jane always made Darcy feel better and that day was no exception.  After quickly informing Jane that they needed a tequila night for Darcy to share her feelings, the reminisced about the good old days of poptarts and getting drunk in an RV.

It inspired her activity for Friday night. 

She bustled into James’ apartment, because that was their officially unofficial meeting spot for the near future.  Giving James a quick wave, she placed the plastic bags onto the dinner table.  She started to unload a few of the boxes.  After balling up the then unnecessary plastic bags she turned to survey the playing field. 

“Can I move the coffee table out a little bit?”  She asked James, who instead of answering, pushed it out for her.  “Thanks James.”  He smiled back.

“Sure thing, Darce.” 

The nickname was new.  But, Darcy had a plan and she wasn’t going to let anything derail it. 

“Any idea where Natasha and Steve are?”

James looked out the window and down at the street, “Nope. They aren’t canoodling in a car.”

Darcy couldn’t help the unattractive burst of laughter.  “Shit Barnes, I was just asking if you got a text from them.  They’re supposed to be picking up the beer.  And tonight is going to need beer.”

That earned her a raised eyebrow.  “It’s a holdover from my internship out in Puente Antiguo.  Jane and I would…you know what, I’m not going to ruin the surprise… I promise it’s going to be ridiculous.  Especially considering I’m the only one of us without some sort of super serum floating around my veins.”  She realized something very important, “I’m gonna be the only one getting smashed tonight.  Fuck.”  She fell back into the couch and closed her eyes, missing the other eyebrow raise that earned her.

“You know, back in my day, ladies didn’t use that kind of language.”  James said with a fairly large smile on his face.

“Well the ladies back in your day can go and fuck themselves with the prude sensibilities they were raised on.” 

He chuckled as Steve and Natasha came in.  Darcy finally raised herself up from her self-imposed moping to see if they had brought anything good. 

They all settled down and Darcy made everyone sit on the floor.  “It’s time for competitive board games!”  She dropped a stack of board games onto the table in the middle of their loose circle.

All three of the other people at the table stared at the stack. 

“Where’s monopoly?”  Steve asked.

Darcy pointed at him, “That game breaks families and I like you people enough that I don’t want to hate you.  These are better options.  Trust me, Jane and I have figured out the perfect mix of games over months and months of nothing to do.”

Then she looked at the pile of boxes and realized something critical.  She pulled a black box out of the pile and set it under the table.  Given the fact that Steve still wasn’t great with pop culture and James was still delicate, it would probably be best to hold off on Cards Against Humanity.

Instead she pulled out Settlers of Catan.  “The rules are simple.  Well, actually the rules of this game can be a little confusing.  And the normal drinking rules for this are complex, but you’re all new, so the drinking rules will be simple for this one.  Every point you gain towards winning you take a drink.  Now considering everyone here but me has enhanced whatevers, I’m thinking you guys take two drinks to my one.”

“Only two?”  Natasha asked.

“Jane, Erik and I played this a lot.  And then we played it once with Thor.  Dear God can that man knock it back.  We made him bring Asgardian Whiskey the next time he played.  To even it out.”

Steve choked on his beer, “You know Thor?”

“Now that SHIELD is gone and so much info is on the internet, yeah I know Thor.  I actually tazed him when we first met.”

It was James’ turn to choke at that.  “You tazed the god of thunder?”

“Twice” Natasha added, smiling fondly.  “Clint made sure I saw the footage, it was pretty impressive.”

“I didn’t know there was footage of the first one.”  Darcy mused, “Was SHIELD watching my every move?”

Natasha shrugged, “Only because the hammer had already fallen, we were on high alert.  That and Clint has a habit of fliming strange things.”

“Is he the guy that picked me up at a ridiculous hour in the morning?”  Natasha nodded, “He’s a dork.” 

Natasha smiled again, “Yeah, he’s a little bit helpless outside of life threatening scenarios.  Used to be in the circus.”

“Maybe we should have him help with my self-defense.  Acrobatics could be fun.” 

She heard someone choke again at that comment, but staunchly ignored whoever it was.  Just because she didn’t have the typical gymnast figure didn’t mean she couldn’t be bendy and aerodynamic if she wanted to.  Instead, she covered the rules of the game and got the board set up.

It was clear about 30 minutes in that even with all three of them having a super serum, and her being a few beers in, that she was going to win the first game.  She had claimed a harbor and managed to get a ton of resources so that she could wantonly trade as she so wished. 

Strategy would win out.  At least for the first game.  The game was being played by two master tacticians, a spy who was very good at on-the-go strategy, and someone who understood the internet and board games (who was also starting to get a little tipsy).  Round 2 was sure to be a very different game.

And so it was.  Round two started off with conflicting strategies.  Darcy and James seemed to go for the ports, while Natasha and Steve went for a variety of resources on the strongholds. 

Round two also started with all of Darcy and Jane’s original rules.  Things like; you drink when the barbarian is moved, everyone else drinks if a settlement is built, and any time you lose cards to the barbarian you have to drink the number of cards you lose.

This game was bitter.  By the end, it was clear that beer wasn’t nearly enough to knock anyone but Darcy flat on their ass.  Everyone had a few empty cans at their feet by that point, but she was the only one who was showing any symptoms of being drunk.  It was aggravating.  At some point, she stopped paying attention completely to strategy, letting longest road slip away, and instead just watched the three incredibly pretty people play. 

All three had gotten incredibly competitive.  Which meant, that all three were tensing up and using all of their skills to distract and manipulate.  Frankly, it was hysterical to see the three of them focus so hard on a board game.  Normally they only acted so seriously on real-life missions. 

At one point, Darcy saw Natasha covertly steal some resources, meanwhile James used a sleight of hand to build some extra roads and while Steve didn’t do anything obviously outrageous, Darcy knew that somehow he was influencing the dice rolls. 

There was no point in trying to play fair with dirty rotten cheaters and there was no beating them at their own game.  At least not when she was so far gone compared to the rest of them. 

Once Natasha came out victorious, Darcy decided it was time to switch games. 

“Normally this is how we start our night, but I didn’t want to get tanked one round in.”  Explained Darcy, pulling out Ticket To Ride.

She explained the real rules, and played a quick round to explain, and then added in the drinking rules. 

This game had a bit more of making other people drink.  You drank for every route card, and drank twice for anything you discarded, any route longer than four and you made someone else drink, if it was five spaces you gave away two drinks.  Additionally for every ten points you earned you got to pass out another drink. 

This was the one that could turn vindictive in a heartbeat. 

Jane, Erik and Darcy had played so often that the strategy was so often worked out to gang up on whoever was doing the best.  It meant that Erik often got plastered because he was some sort of Ticket To Ride savant.  He sucked at every other game, but that one he was great.

It was by unspoken agreement that Darcy, James and Natasha all ganged up on Steve.  Every time someone had to give out a drink, it was given to Steve.  It was at least partially due to the fact that there were rumors that he couldn’t get drunk.  At least nothing on Earth had done the trick so far.

That night wasn’t meant to be the night, because even with all the extra drinks he was mostly unruffled.

Though at the end of the game when the points were tallied up Steve had managed to win and Darcy desperately wanted some water.

Steve and Natasha started to put the game together for another round while Darcy went into the kitchen to get a glass of water.  Turning around, she almost ran into James’ chest.  Her water almost spilled but she managed to save it. 

“Are you okay?” he asked with furrowed brow. 

“Yeah,” she waved him off, “rounds normally get a bit more unhinged than this.  Erik loses his pants, Jane starts talking in science terms, and then someone vomits and… normally that person isn’t me.”

“Are you about to vomit?”

She shook her head and immediately thought better.  “I’m gonna be fine, just need some water,” she held up the glass as proof.

“Do you want to sit out the next round?”

“Hell no, I’ll just play with water.  Jane would be so disappointed.”

He huffed a laugh, “Next time we’ll make sure we get something stronger for Natasha and Steve.”

“Not you?”  She leaned in just a little.

He didn’t move, “I’m not sure I want to see what happens if I get intoxicated.” 

Even Darcy’s alcohol addled mind could see the wisdom in that.  She patted his arm, “You’re doing really well.”

He looked at her with a bittersweet expression. Seconds passed and Darcy wished she could ask what he was thinking, but she knew it would be a bad idea to ask while she wasn’t at her best.  There were already too many times where something was said and she was at a loss for words.

The moment broke when James turned to go back to Steve and Natasha who were arguing over proper board setup.  Darcy followed him, gulping down water. 

The weird vibe that they had together dissipated fairly quickly as they picked up their trail cards.  The drinks and the games were off.

 

The next day truly sucked.  Going into work hungover was always shitty.  At least at Starbucks she had coworkers who would sympathetically fix a coffee.

At Stark Industries, all there was, was Brad who was still bugging her for Natalie Rushman’s contact information.  Information that Brad was never going to get.

Sitting at her desk, Darcy was lost in thought.  She remembered the previous night, but the memory was a bit fuzzy the way things got when she had had just a little bit too much to drink.  It hadn’t been a crazy night, she saved the best (or worst) of the crazy nights for the times when someone broke out the tequila.  Plus, she was being paid to spend time with James.  It would be rude to get wasted on the clock.

While she stood at the coffee maker and watched it drip all she could think about was the tense, almost disappointed silence in the kitchen when she had been getting water.  She couldn’t think about what it was for. 

She grabbed her coffee, poured a shit ton of sugar in it, with a dash of cream, and went back to her desk to wallow. 

Hoping against hope that she wouldn’t get a phone call so that she could quietly sit and drink her coffee, her hopes were quickly dashed.  The entire day was spent running around the building trying to put out fires.  Easily avoidable fires, which made the whole day that much worse.  Working in IT, it was inevitable that she would reach the point in the day where she felt she had earned the right to mock the people for the basic mistakes.  That day, she hit her limit at 9:15am.

After practically crawling home, she curled up in her bed and fought sleep.  It was time to do a bit more research.  She looked into a few other activities that she thought James might enjoy and bookmarked one or two that seemed particularly promising. 

As soon as she felt that she had completed what she needed to, she checked in with her group.  It seemed like things were going well.  No one was asking for help getting out of anything illegal (thank god that last person to get in trouble was Jerry with his speeding ticket – that didn’t even need anything computer oriented to help).  Someone was trying to build a program and Darcy did a quick look over a section of code they were asking about, didn’t see any errors and blamed it on the fact that she felt her molecules out of place. 

Lastly, she talked to Patty.  She needed to make sure that Patty wasn’t still a little heartbroken over abandoning her search for the Winter Soldier.

Patty, of course, had found a new project, and was tracking where Spiderman worked throughout the city.  Darcy smiled, that would be a much safer project.  Spiderman had never killed anyone.

Content that everything was taken care of, Darcy shut off her computer, put in on the chest at the bottom of her bed and curled into a ball.  Covering her head with the comforter, she finally let tired eyes rest and shut out the rest of the world. 


	13. Is this the start of something new?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You know those times that something changes at work and then your entire life goes crazy. This is the start of one of those.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is a day late. I was up in New York for an exhibit on Harry Potter for the 20 year anniversary of the first books release. It was a ton of fun, but I am absolutely exhausted. 
> 
> That means there are probably some spelling and punctuation errors in this, feel free to point them out so I can get them fixed. I'm adoring the comments I'm getting on these chapters from the people who have just found this to the people who have been here since the first chapter. I love hearing from you guys!

That Friday, Darcy decided that she was finally ready to spend some time with James alone.  He hadn’t had any violent sessions.  What had seemed like a smart move when the contract had first been signed now seemed overly cautious and Darcy wanted to prove that she trusted him.

That, however, did not stop her from having them meet in a public place.  A Bowling Alley seemed like the perfect activity.  Bowling wasn’t something that Darcy had ever had a talent for, but even if she only scored a 37, it always seemed to put her in a good mood. 

She waited outside, a little nervous.  Even though she had spent a decent amount of time with him the possibility for something to wrong with no backup wouldn’t let her relax.  Some of the apprehension died when she first saw James. He walked up to her and looked at the sign behind her, his smile told her it hadn’t been a bad choice.  It was such an innocent expression that Darcy started to feel better.

They walked inside and got a lane.  Darcy insisted that she pay which put a weird expression on James’ face, at least until she agreed that he could buy the French fries and “soda pop” (they had agreed to call it soda pop because the debate as to whether it was soda or pop had gotten surprisingly personal pretty quickly.  It was easier to appease both ideas). 

Darcy grabbed a few bowling balls while James went for the snacks. It was a veritable pile of goodies that he brought back.  There were French fries, two hot dogs, a few slices of pizza, sodas for both of them, as well as a pitcher of beer.

“I already ate dinner, so I hope most of that is for you.” She blurted out, shocked at the sheer amount of what he had bought.  Not missing the drop in his shoulders she added, “though that pizza looks pretty good, You might end up with both hot dogs though.” 

Surprisingly, James was a good bowler.  Good enough that Darcy had to insist he not use the metal arm.  “It’s just not fair.  You have cybernetic enhancements and I’m just a boring old human.”

“Darcy, I don’t think anyone would say that you’re boring.” 

“Compared to who I hang out with? Hell even Jane is dating the God of Thunder when she isn’t making holes in space in her free time.  I’m just outmatched.”  She said it all with a smile.  Who wouldn’t be proud of their friends and everything they could do.  Frankly, Darcy was happier in the background, and when she needed attention it wasn’t exactly hard to get.

He was heading up to bowl and so she didn’t see his frown.  And then it wasn’t his place.

The subject dropped and they went back to heckling each other at inopportune moments, eating French fries and drinking beer.  By the end of the evening Darcy was completely relaxed around him and wondering why she had been so nervous in the first place.

In all the months of spending time together he had never seemed dangerous, not to her.  Stories of his past weren't exaggerated (she had found the files and watched some videos that weren't for public consumption).  But it seemed that times had changed, even his fugue states never resulted in him harming anyone.  Just becoming and empty shell of himself.   

It was nice that everything went smoothly. 

Until the next week happened.  That wasn’t meant to sound daunting or morbid.  Darcy got a promotion, the promotion she had been hoping she would get since the very beginning.  She would still be taking calls, but she was also expected to look over some of the coding used in various systems.  It was much more her style.

She was pretty sure that at least part of the promotion was due to the way she discouraged people from calling again.  People didn’t seem to appreciate being called idiots and apparently that got them to try to restart their computers before calling IT.  Somehow no real complaints had been made (or they had been ignored) because Darcy was clearly benefiting from the situation.  To be fair, everyone in the IT department was benefiting. 

But now, Darcy got to work on something she actually liked doing.  While writing code wasn’t her strongest suit (the revenge on her professor was pretty much her tour de force) but she was damn good at picking out mistakes in code.  It was one of the things that had endeared her to her online community.

They could write code with the best of them but a few got slopping with their slashes and brackets. 

In the morning, she would plug her headphones into the computer, bring up Spotify and go to town on whatever she had been sent.

She was living the life.  Plus the promotion came with another pay raise.  She was finally making more than she could have dreamed.  Occasionally she thought about her wasted major, but would shrug it off.  College was worth the experience if nothing else.  Even if her degree wasn’t being used, some of the skills that had been taught were useful.

Mostly, knowing how to look between the lines. 

And there was a line of code that looked out of place.  Looking up a few lines and down a few lines, it was clear it had been slipped in there to cause trouble.  She tagged it and sent it to her boss, Alba, knowing that this wasn’t just a simple mistake.

But then she went on with her day.  A malicious line of code wasn’t her problem.  It was just her job to point it out.

At 3pm, she was called into her boss’s office.  The lady was a bit of a hardass so she walked in and bounced nervously in the spartan office.  There only pictures on the walls were the generic ones that covered the hallways of the buildings.  The desk was empty except for a single framed picture that wasn't facing out.  Alba was sitting at her computer, typing away, and barely glanced up at Darcy before continuing with her work.  Darcy stood for almost a minute, just waiting to find out what she was there for. 

“Did you write this?”  Alba had turned her computer screen around so Darcy could see what she was talking about.  It was the line of code that Darcy had flagged.

She scoffed, “Of course not.  I just found it.  Looked like it was meant to do some damage.”

“Do you know who wrote this?”

She looked at her likes he was crazy.  She was hyper-focused on her and the attention was starting to make it obvious that Darcy hadn’t just found something minor.  “I have no idea.  I’ve only just been allowed access to the code, and not in its entirety.”  Although now it was clear the breach was more serious than she had expected. It seemed like she might be spending a lot of time in the future looking over the code again.

Which was exactly what happened.  She was tasked with going through the entire program, even the parts that had already been reviewed.  A few people had already looked at the section that had flagged her interest, meaning the mistake had already been overlooked a few times.

 

That evening she only just made it to self-defense on time, earning her a hard look from Steve.  “I’m fine, I’m fine.  Okay,” she took in a deep breath, “let’s go.”

Class didn’t last too long.  After about 45 minutes of Steve correcting her posture and restarting the scenario, he called everything off. 

“You’re more distracted than normal.”

“Yeah, there’s a thing going on at work.  Gonna be working crazy hours to get it figured out.”  She was breathing heavily.

“You didn’t even try to distract me from teaching you proper form.   Are you sure that’s it?”

She shrugged, “If there’s anything else my mind is trying to keep me from noticing it… So, now what do we do with the rest of the evening?”

They stood there and then Darcy decided she needed ice cream before she went back to work.

As they stood in line waiting for their ice cream (a cone for Steve and a cup for Darcy) Steve asked about bowling.  “Bucky seemed to have a good time with you.”

Darcy looked over the flavors.  “Yeah, he’s a really good bowler.  I didn’t expect to get so badly creamed.  But,” she shrugged,” probably should have expected he’d be good at it.”

She ordered a rainbow sorbet while Steve went for Rocky Road.  “And you think you’re done needing supervision while spending time together?”

Darcy raised an eyebrow, “You implying something there Cap?”  She let the P in Cap pop.

He rolled his eyes, and she continued.  “I mean, I figure we still do things like game night, but he’s proved that I don’t need the extra caution.”  She shrugged and took a big bite of her sorbet to keep her from talking. 

As he walked her back to the office, they kept chatting.  It was good to catch up with Steve now that she wasn’t attending parties with him every couple of weeks.  Frankly, it was refreshing to see him so relaxed, because dancing never seemed to relax him.  Sparring however seemed to help all of his muscles release and bring out a smile. 

“So how’re things with Natasha?”  She said with an eyebrow wiggle.

He choked on his ice cream.  After coughing he asked a bewildered, “What are you talking about?”

“Are you guys not moving towards being a thing?”

Steve started laughing, to the point where they had to stop making forward progress so that he could rest a hand on his knee to keep vertical.  “Oh goodness no.  My buddy Sam, you’ve met Sam right?  Sam is trying to woo her.”

Darcy laughed, she vaguely remembered him.  The lean, attractive black man from DC.  “Oh really?  They’d make a pretty good couple.”

“Natasha knows exactly what’s happening too.  I think she’s waiting for him to notice how ridiculous he’s being before she finally agrees to a date.”

“Did he bring her flowers?”  Darcy asked, knowing Natasha wasn’t a fan of things that would die.

“Twice.”  Steve started laughing again.

“Did she make that face?” 

He nodded, still unable to speak.  Darcy caught his case of the giggles.  They laughed all the way to the elevator.  Darcy pressing her button for floor 23 and Steve going for floor 87.  “Oh hey,” Darcy said as the door opened.  “Did you ever get that new mattress?” For some reason the question made Steve blush.  Clearly there was a story there.  Unfortunately the elevator door started closing and Darcy had to get back to work.

She narrowed her eyes and pointed at them and then at Steve.  She would find out what that reaction was for sooner rather than later.

Until that time would happen she had work to do.  She was at the office until 10pm looking through everything.  Same deal for Tuesday.  Long hours of staring at the computer.  On her lunch break, Darcy went to grab a sandwich and eye drops.  Her eyes hadn’t been so dry since she had to write three pages in a week Sophomore year of college.

On Wednesday, she texted James early giving him a warning that she might be a little bit late.  Luckily she was far enough ahead on her work that instead of having to stay late late, she got to leave at 6:30pm.

She arrived at James’ apartment with a few minutes to spare. Once he answered the door she pushed past him and immediately fell into the couch.  Groaning, she tried to stretch out her neck and back but they stubbornly continued to ache.

“Sorry, James.  I’m pretty beat.  Not sure I’m going to be the best of company tonight.”

She snuggled deeper into the couch, pulling the blanket that had appeared weeks before around her.  She had claimed the blanket as her own.  It didn’t seem like James ever used it anyway. 

James made popcorn, the way he always did on movie night.  He brought the bowl over and started the movie.  Darcy had tried to make sure he got all the movies that he needed to understand at least some of pop culture.  The list was long and ever growing, and they tended to jump around.  Darcy didn’t want to inundate him with only Disney movies, or movies that had too many references he wouldn’t understand (here’s looking at you Shrek) and A League of Their Own was still going to wait for Steve to get his head out of his ass because it was a damn good movie and she was going to make sure he saw it even if it killed her.

But the list for James included classics like When Harry Met Sally, and Ghostbusters (only the first one, not number 2 for so many reasons) and Die Hard (which Darcy was putting off considering it seemed like it might have moments that would cause problems.  But tonight’s movie.  Tonight’s movie was a classic: Back to the Future. 

They popped in the DVD and before Marty could even make it to the past, Darcy was asleep. 

She woke up slowly.  Warmth infused her body, allowing her to stretch luxuriously.  It took a few moments to realize that the warmth wasn’t just due to the blanket, but that somehow in her sleep she had moved towards James and was now leaning up against his side.

Not under his arm, but against his arm.  It seemed like he was holding himself fairly carefully.  Darcy yawned and pushed herself up.  There were still a few minutes left in the movie.  Lightning was about to hit the clock tower.  “Sorry about getting all up in your space.  Guess I was more tired than I thought.”

“It isn’t a problem.”  He said, still staring at the television.

She sense he didn’t want to make a big deal about it and was happy enough to comply.  “Have you liked the movie?”

“His mother was flirting with him.”  He said, scandalized.

She yawned again, trying to focus.  “Yeah, the 80’s were a weird time in movies. Just wait until we get into Star Wars.  But other than that?”

“It’s okay.”

She finished rubbing her eyes, “Yeah, it’s not everyone’s cup of tea but it’s a cultural landmark.  This movie was one of the only ways that I could get Jane away from the lab.  She loves watching movies with faulty science and bitching about them the entire time.  Never watch Armageddon with her unless it’s the version with Ben Affleck narrating.”

“What does she complain about with this movie?”

“Well, she tends to start with how the delorean is the car least suited to time travel, and don’t ask me her reasons, I’ve heard it often enough that I’ve learned how to tune them out.  Then there’s a discussion about the Butterfly Effect, how Doc Brown shouldn’t actually be considered a doctor.  The list goes on.”

He chuckled, “I didn’t realize there was that much wrong with this movie.  I was just confused that someone would check someone’s underwear to find their name.  Wouldn’t the best guess to be to go for a wallet?”

Darcy laughed, “I’ll have to tell Jane that one.  Not sure it’s made the list.”  She snapped her fingers, “Which reminds me.  I’m not gonna be able to hang out this weekend.  Jane is in town for a conference and I haven’t seen her in so long.  Could we reschedule?”

He grimaced a little, “Of course.” 

“I’ll come over Tuesday and Wednesday next week…. Or on Sunday would you be up for stopping at the convention to meet Jane?”

That elicited a smile.  “Of course.”

 

 


	14. Tequila and Science Should Always Mix

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jane is back!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is late again, I knew I was going to need some hangover recovery on Saturday but it pretty much turned into the whole day! That being said, this is a pretty decently sized chapter so hopefully that makes up for it. 
> 
> Have a great Thanksgiving everyone! I'm thankful to all of you stopping by.

Jane arrived that Friday night.  That meant that Friday night became Tequila night.

There was karaoke, tequila, and dancing with a number of strangers.  Friday night was amazing.  Saturday morning sucked balls.

Both Darcy and Jane were fairly hungover, but over the years of their friendship that had been a fairly common occurrence.  Even if neither woman could hold their alcohol quite as well as when they were in Puente Antiguo (let’s be honest. There was nothing to do there except to build up an alcohol tolerance in Puente Antiguo) they still managed to have a pretty wild night.

Even with the hangover, the first half of Saturday was spent running to and from various lectures.  Darcy was playing the part of assistant again.  She was carrying all of Jane’s shit and helping the woman take notes and when she presented in the afternoon, was the one who went in an hour early to make sure the powerpoint would function perfectly.  If she took a bit of time before that to make sure that the powerpoint didn’t look like it was designed by someone who was born in the 60s (for all the Jane was a genius, her powerpoints skills were sadly lacking) nobody had to know.

It ended up being an amazing day.  Jane kicked ass at her lecture; with SHIELD out of the way she could finally talk about all of the research she had done that had NDA’s attached.  She talked about the Einstein-Rosen bridge that connected Asgard with Earth.  Talked about how she had worked on creating a portal between Earth and Asgard, and how close she was to making it.  Basically, Jane blew the pants off of all of the scientists who were there.

The day ended at the hotel bar where Darcy dug into her burger while Jane demolished an oversized plate of pasta (after stealing a few of Darcy’s French fries of course.  What else is friendship for).  And finally, finally, Darcy had a chance to talk to someone about all the crazy stuff that had happened in the last few months.

She had decided to explain how she had actually met Steve, which had Jane giggling. She explained the fallout from the unmasking of SHIELD’s dark corners (even mentioning the hard drive she had full of blackmail material in case Jane ever needed some Leverage).  And then she had to explain James.  How to explain a brainwashed super soldier assassin.  She talked about their movie nights, the self-defense classes, how James always made popcorn for said movie nights.  “He’s a pretty good guy once you get past how terrifying he can be.”

Unfortunately, a new voice joined the conversation.  “Jane Foster?” 

They turned to see Tony Stark standing there.  His Van Dyke was perfectly trimmed, suit was impeccably tailored, and his charm was turned to 100%.  “I saw your lecture today.  As someone who works with Thor.  How did you get him to stop telling stories in order to talk to him about Asgard?”

Jane’s mouth dropped open for a second before she recovered her senses.  “Well, I hit him with my car first.  And then Darcy tazed him.  Does a pretty good job of silencing someone.”

Darcy started laughing, partially due to how ludicrous the situation was, but partly because Jane didn’t mean any of that as a joke.  It was just plain absurd what her life had become.

Tony turned to her.  “Darcy, that name sounds familiar.  You’re Barnes’ friend aren’t you?”  He didn’t look pleased to say that.  She had to assume that Steve had gotten the balls to tell Tony about his parents.  It’s not like she had given him any reason to dislike her other than her relationship with James.

Darcy wasn’t gonna let some punk like Tony Stark knock her down.  “Yup, I’m teaching him all about the modern world.  Plus I kind of also work for you.”

His head tilted, “Which department?”

“IT, they have me running through code right now.”

He snapped his fingers.  “You’re the one who found the malicious code…”  he looked her up and down and Darcy raised an eyebrow.  If it had set off any alarms she would have had her taser out in seconds.  Instead of feeling creepy, it just felt like he was sizing up the competition.  He then flatly ignored her.  “Dr. Foster. I want to hire you.  I think you would be a boon to the Avengers initiative.  The idea of being able to create and Einstein-Rosen bridge…” he trailed off.  “And you’re really the only person who would be able to.”

Jane blushed at that.  “I don’t know, I’ve been at Culver…”

“I know what they pay, trust me.  You’ll do better at SI.”

“Send me a contract and I’ll think about it.”  Jane bargained, while glancing at Darcy to see what she thought. 

Darcy gave what she thought was a subtle thumbs up, this could be the answer to all of Jane’s funding woes.  Plus if it brought back Jane’s literal prince, there could only be good things happening.  Mostly Jane getting laid, it made her way more docile and willing to quit after a 14 hour day.

Jane and Tony finished talked and as he walked away, both women bounced in their seats.  “I mean, obviously don’t sign anything without reading, but Jane think about what this could do for your research!”

“I know.  Maybe I can finally buy some replacement parts…”

“Instead of using Duct Tape!”  Darcy finished her sentence.  “Next round is on me.  Even if we were trying not to repeat last night, we need to do something!”

They went through the next round of drinks and one more after that.  At which point, instead of going home to her comfortable apartment, Darcy stumbled up to Jane’s room (with Jane of course) to crash on the spare bed.

With such an exciting weekend, Jane made it to the first talk, but barely.  Darcy straight up went back to sleep.  She wasn’t Jane’s intern anymore so it wasn’t like she was really required to follow after her. 

 

Around noon, Darcy finally decided that it was time to be a functioning member of society.  Just one who needed to stop home for new clothes first. While Darcy was a little bit tempted to not go back to the convention, she still did want to spend more time with Jane.  Even if Jane did end up working at SI, there was no set timeline for how long it would take her to get set up, much less to move tot he area.

Being a good friend won out over the laziness.  The lecturers on Sunday were nowhere near as fun.  That was partially because, scientists, as a whole, knew how to cut loose.  The people speaking clearly didn’t want to be there, and the audience was in a similar boat.

But Darcy did her duty and sat next to Jane with a recorder on her knee and a notebook out so she could pretend to be taking notes.  She was really doodling, and showing Jane the particularly good ones.  Jane would smack at her arm and shush her, but the fond look in her eyes showed that she had clearly missed Darcy’s presence. 

On their way out of the last lecture, Darcy suddenly remembered something important.  “Oh, James was disappointed that I had to cancel on him on Friday and I invited him to dinner.  Is that okay?”

Jane gave her the side eye.  “Sure?”

“Do you want me to invite Steve and Natasha too?  If they haven’t been sent anywhere I’m sure they’d like to meet you.”

“Why would they want to meet me?”

“Thor and I have many things in common.”  Darcy looked at Jane to make sure she was listening, “one of them is our inability to shut the fuck up about things we care about.”  Jane giggled at that, “between the two of us I’m pretty sure they know more about you than you’d probably be comfortable with.” 

“Oh no, what did you tell them?”

“Well,” Darcy waved her hands as they walked outside of the hotel, “I taught them all how to do a proper game night, though next time we’re gonna need some stronger alcohol.  Plus, I told James all about how you bitch about scientific inaccuracies, and I’ve told them all about my internship with you, and…” 

Jane waved her hands, “I get it.  Sure, invite them.  Just make sure we go to a burger place.  I want old school comfort food.”

Darcy smiled, “sure thing.  I know a few of the best junk food connoisseurs.”  She whipped out her phone and texted Steve asking if he knew of any greasy spoons in the area.

The answer was almost instantaneous so Darcy started a group text with Steve, Natasha and James telling them to get to the greasy spoon ASAP.

Darcy and Jane had walked over and grabbed the biggest booth they had.  It was an old school establishment, the kind of place that had red vinyl booths cracked from the numerous butts that had visited.  The kind of place where the floors and tables were a little bit sticky and the staff members looked like they had stayed at the job a year too long to leave and had gotten used to the inevitability that they would work there until they died.  Most importantly, it was the kind of place where you could smell the food from outside the door and the scent screamed heart attack.

Jane sighed happily as she looked through the menu.   She and Darcy had already ordered their burgers The food arrived the same time as their other guests and it was only then that Darcy realized that they probably should have waited.

Jane had no such compunctions.

“Here, we’ll make room.”  Darcy said, pushing her bag further to the side.  Jane, with a huge bite of burger in her mouth, nodded and tried to move the plate with her elbows as her hands were still full of burger.

Darcy looked at Jane, a little worried.  “Is this the first food you’re actually eating today?”

Jane shifted uncomfortably and nodded. 

Darcy laughed, “Ah, good times.”  She turned to the others and watched in awe as they all managed to fit in the now suddenly tiny booth.  “Sorry for Jane here.  We may have overdone ourselves this weekend and while I am perfectly capable of making myself eat even when I’m nauseous as fuck, Jane here is a delicate little flower.”

“I’m not sure I’d call anyone who can keep up with Thor delicate.”  Natasha grinned slyly.  Steve’s face went a funny shade of red, Sam let out a horrified chuckle and Jane choked on her milkshake.

Darcy being a horrible friend laughed so hard that she started to tear up.  “Ohmygod.  Jane.  That’s right, you have no excuse to never work out again.  You’re gonna need to work hard to keep up with Thor!!!!”

Jane blushed, and went back to devouring her burger, hoping that it was large enough to hide her face forever.

Darcy let her attempt to hide in her puddle of embarrassment.  “So what have all of you gotten up to today?”

James and Steve looked at each other, clearly debating what to tell her.  “We’ve been training.”  Sam said, ending the silent discussion.  Though James tensed when he said this, which wasn’t given away by the change in his posture, but the fact that he was sitting next to Darcy and she could suddenly feel the lack of movement. 

Given Sam’s slightly disgruntled tone, it seemed like Steve and James had been having quasi-silent conversations all day.  Probably a good thing, a return to the status quo of their relationship.  “It seems like Bucky wants to get back in the field, before that can happen we need to know what he can do.” 

Darcy’s head whipped around so she could stare at James.  James who was currently avoiding her eyes by the way he had his face buried in his menu.  He hadn’t told her, and frankly she was surprised. 

“Oh.”  And boy could that word hold so many different meanings.  The meaning of this one was clear enough.

“That doesn’t mean it’s going to happen anytime soon.”  Natasha added, “Just a check to see what is possible now and what needs to be done when and if the time comes.”

Pacified, Darcy sat back in her seat, though she no longer seemed to want the burger.  She tried to stealthily push it to Steve, but the sticky tables combined with the old school plates made a pretty horrendous noise.  She gave up, “Steve, you want this?  Not sure I feel like a burger anymore.  More like a buttload of fries.”

Steve gave her a face, knowing she wasn’t normally one to pass up a burger, but seemed happy enough to take it off her hands.  After all he would have needed to order a couple of burgers anyway.  With the unwanted burger gone, Darcy decided to focus on Sam and Natasha.

If Steve was right, she wanted to see him try to woo her.  Though looking at the two of them made Darcy think all the fun had ended.  Sam didn’t seem jumpy and Natasha didn’t seem to be putting on one of her many faces to make him nervous.

“So, Natasha, have you talked to Brad recently?”

Sam perked up and Natasha rolled her eyes, “I don’t know how he managed to find the email that I made when I worked at SI six years ago… but if he doesn’t stop soon, he’s going to become well acquainted with the floor.” 

Darcy listened to the answer while keeping half an eye on Sam.  He had perked up at the mention of Brad but seemed to relax at Natasha’s implied threat.  He went as far to reach his arm around the back of the booth, not quite touching her shoulders. 

That made it clear.  Dude knew what he was doing.  Didn’t bother to try and defend her, because obviously Natasha could defend herself and most other people would just get in the way.

“Feel free to do whatever you wish.  He still hasn’t left me alone about getting your number.”

Natasha frowned, to make it go away Darcy points between Natasha and Sam, “So when did this happen?”  Sam snorts into the water he’s drinking and Natasha’s expression goes completely stunned before her eyes narrowed.

“How did you figure it out?”

Darcy shrugged, “ A little birdie told me about the possibility, and he’s” she nodded at Sam, “Not falling all over himself to try to make you happy, so…”  She smiled.  “When?”

“That’s classified.”  Steve butted in.

“Just like all of SHIELD’s documents and how you were ‘Captain America’ in secret the first time we met, classified?”

Finally Jane burst out laughing.  “I hadn’t realized you were like this with all of your friends!  I thought it was just me.” 

“Oh, I only break the law and harass government goons for the best of friends.”

“Oh is that what you call it?” Steve asked.

“Sometimes it isn’t even illegal.  Most of the SHIELD documents I pulled were on legal sites.”

“Most?”

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to.”  She said mischievously. 

Dinner continued on.  The poor waitress had multiple trays of food to carry over what with Steve and Bucky’s multiple burgers, the varied orders of French fries and plethora of drinks.

Jane loosened up as dinner went on.  She had been quiet at the beginning, but that wasn’t surprising.  Jane, while rabid about science, could be surprisingly shy.  Add in meeting a few of the Avengers (the ones she wasn’t sleeping with) and it could be understandable that she would be worried that she didn’t have anything to say.

But fuck that.  Darcy knew Jane, knew her well enough to guess that she was wearing pink underwear (every girl had period underwear, but not every girl had I’m too hungover to want to wear anything that could possibly make me uncomfortable underwear).  So, Darcy wanted Jane to be friends with her friends, and Darcy knew how to draw Jane out of her comfort zone. It worked like a charm.  By the end of dinner, Jane had completely won over Steve (not that that was particularly difficult – he was still pretty awestruck by bold women) and had James grinning.

Darcy liked to think that it was one of her skills to bring people together.  It was true if you didn’t think about her ex-boyfriends, that sorority group she tried to invade in college and almost anyone she was in a foster home with (so sue her, she could be a bad judge of character…. And especially bad at figuring out what personality types might mesh) but she had done a good job here. 

It also helped that Darcy was pretty sure that Jane was going to take the job at SI.  There would be proper funding, a lab that wasn’t held together with duct tape, and a few minds to share insights with.  Darcy wasn’t sure that Jane would be able to turn that offer down, even if everything else didn’t seem amazing.

Now this meant that Jane might know some of the people wandering around the halls.  It wasn’t super likely considering none of them ever really saw Darcy at work, but given the labs were on a higher floor she couldn’t rule out the possibility.

They all finished eating and Steve, graciously, paid the check.  Darcy glanced at the bill and he left a hefty enough tip that the waitress was flustered.  Yet again, Darcy glanced back and the poor girl was bright red and staring adoringly at them through the window.

Steve didn’t do anything for the publicity, but it didn’t change the fact that Steve’s genuine personality definitely helped the Avengers PR person not go crazy over the stupid shit that everyone else did. 

Outside the restaurant, Darcy hugged everyone goodbye before walking back to the hotel with Jane.  Darcy linked her arm with Jane’s and expression of affection that she knew Jane would pick up on.  The slight pat on her arm said the move was appreciated. 

“So, James smiles at you a lot.”

“Everyone smiles at me a lot.  It’s part of being a ridiculous human being.  I amuse people.”

“Darcy…” Jane’s tone of voice said she wouldn’t take any deflecting.  And wasn’t that what made her such a good friend.  Jane could get completely lost in science and not notice a thing about the real world for hours on end, but she didn’t settle for bullshit.

When Darcy was being self-deprecating, Jane was the person who called bullshit, who helped Darcy remember her good qualities outweighed the bad.

“I’m his guide to the modern world.  Of course he smiles at me.  I’m the reason he gets the occasional reference.”

“I think it’s more than that.”  Jane said, but let the matter go.  Darcy didn’t want to think about the possibility that she meant more to James than her contract stated.  It may not have been healthy but Darcy didn’t want to push the boundary. She liked what they had.  The casual friendship was nice as she hadn’t had anything ‘strings-free’ in so long.  Besides, all of her best friendships started out with a contract.  Jane was an internship, Steve was a dating service, and all of her online friends… well there wasn’t a contract there but they weren’t people that she could sit next to during a movie and fall asleep on.

Instead of focusing on her relationship with James, Darcy talked to Jane about the contract Stark had offered. 

A quick read-through while she should have been paying attention to a lecture showed that it was surprisingly weighted in Jane’s favor.  It wasn’t clear how much of that was due to Jane being involved with Thor, or how much of it was based off of the copious amounts of research that Jane had produced.

Still, it seemed like a good idea to take it.  That was the Jane was leading anyway, though she didn’t like the idea of leaving Culver.  Even if some of the professors had been huge bags of flaccid dicks, most of the students she had worked with had been wonderful and Jane didn’t like the idea of leaving them high and dry.

“Give out your email.”  Darcy suggested, which made Jane brighten up.  The easiest answer was to pass out contact information for anyone who wanted to follow in Jane’s footsteps.  Plus it looked like it would be possible to set up internships within SI so any students who would be interested in literally following in Jane’s footsteps would have an option.

At the hotel, they had one last hug.  A hug that lasted probably 10 seconds too long, but neither woman was quite ready to let go. 

“I’ll see you in no time.”  Jane said.

“Just make sure I have access to your lab so I can drag you to have a decent meal every once and a while.” 

Jane smiled at that.  “There’s no one I’d rather have dictating my life.”

They hugged again after that, because how could you not.


	15. How It Went Depends On Who You're Asking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time for more bonding. It goes well, it goes poorly, and how it went depends on who you're asking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I need to stop promising an update on a Saturday night. Things keep happening on Saturday nights. Well, it was a fun Thanksgiving and I have a really big week in front of me so I'm glad I'm still getting this out. On the bright side I have maybe the next five chapters already proofed and mostly ready to go! I have plenty more coming and there's some stuff to get very excited over coming up soon.

And so life went on.  The biweekly meet-ups with James continued. 

A few weeks after James met Jane, he asked Darcy if they could go dancing.  Darcy went ahead and dressed to the nines to take James to a club.  The way he had stared at her in the tight jeans and low cut halter top was enjoyable thought the experience at the club didn’t go quite as well as she hoped.

He had seemed a little overwhelmed walking in: the loud music, the bright lights, the swell of humanity all around them.  Everything had gone well at first.  Avoiding any real suggestion of alcohol, Darcy had dragged him onto the floor and had enjoyed being able to press her body up against hers. 

Except… Except something about the situation was triggering.  She could feel the moment he went from swaying against her to flat.  He wasn’t quite in a fugue state, but he wasn’t all there.  Coaxing him out from the crowd of people was surprisingly easy, although everything about the way he walked screamed ‘lethal.’  To be fair that was probably what made it so easy to leave.  Anyone who wasn’t blackout drunk knew to dive out of their way.

Leaving the club so early in the evening seemed strange but it was so much more important to get James home. 

They arrived at his apartment and Darcy ordered (she hated to use that word, but gentle suggesting seemed to do nothing) that he take off his constricting jacket.  She popped in his favorite movie so far (Ghostbusters) and made some popcorn.

She put the bowl in his lap and sat next to him throughout the movie until finally, finally he brought some popcorn to his mouth.

“You okay?”  She asked, knowing that was probably the stupidest question to ask in the moment.

“I will be.”  He sighed, “Sorry for ruining the night.”

“Don’t feel bad.  I wasn’t thinking.  Crowds are never a good thing.”

“Crowds aren’t the problem.  It was the lighting…” He didn’t go into any further explanation but Darcy’s mental checklist added strobe lights to the list of things to avoid in the future.

The next time they met to go dancing, Darcy let James plan the date.  After taking him out of his comfort zone that Friday it seemed only fair.  His only request was that she wear a dress that could flair out.

Looking through her closet, she chose the polka dot dress that had caught Steve’s attention oh so long ago. He picked her up and she could swear that his eyes almost looked like they belonged in a cartoon.  They practically jumped out of his head.  “Lookin’ good doll.”  Was his only comment, a comment that seemed to belong in the 1940’s. 

He had found a place that did swing dancing during the week.  She looked at the couples whirring about.  So many of them were older.  Older couples that were perfectly made up; women in flaring dresses, men in nice suits, all of whom seemed to know exactly what they were doing.

“I don’t know the steps.”  She said haltingly.  He had been so excited that she didn’t want to ruin the night for him.

“It’s a good thing I do then.  I can lead you.”

She couldn’t fight the thrill in her body at his words.  And true to his word, he could lead pretty well.  They swung around the room, Darcy almost laughing at the glint in his eye.  For all that he had seemed to enjoy their time together, he never seemed as alive as he did that night. 

He was all casual touches, and eyes that caught the light, and a smile that burnt itself into her heart. 

After a few rounds of dancing, Darcy knew she needed a breather. While she had been doing self-defense which just happened to include a ridiculous amount of running, this was a whole different muscle group and she was barely keeping up.

Getting a bottle of water, she took the opportunity to watch him.  He was probably closer to his old self than he had been since he feel from that train.  While she had known that his body had strength she had never quite seen him move in the way he did in that community center.

Knowing and seeing were two completely different things.  He didn’t look dangerous while flinging his partner (the best female dancer there, by far) around, but you could see the calculated movements, the way his body knew where to move and what to do. 

Darcy knew this was something they would have to keep doing.  And maybe she needed to let James choose more of their outings.  She had never thought that dancing wouldn’t just be the movement in the clubs.  The smoky feeling of someone right up on you, instead of the quick paced twirls and foot movements she saw here. 

She might have been teaching James about the modern era, but that didn’t mean she should disregard his past in order to do that.

Her next choice for an outing was going to the museum with Steve.  She knew that Steve and James had gone to museums when they were kids if only because it was one of the few places they could go where they wouldn’t have to pay…

Regardless, everyone knew about Captain America’s love of art, and she though it would be fun to take them to see what was out there.

She told James the plan and he groaned.  She was taken a little aback.  It had taken her a while to feel comfortable suggesting another outing after her last one had gone so poorly.  Possibly she had become a little over-cautious, but a museum had seemed like a wonderful idea. 

She pulled her hands into her sweater and busied herself in James’ kitchen, not doing all that much as it was still relatively spotless, but gave her an excuse to do something with her hands. 

“Darcy, I know you’ve made Steve’s day but you’ve never seen him in a museum.” 

Darcy had also never heard the whiny undertone in James’ voice before.  Either he was acting ridiculous to get back in her good graces or Steve really was a pain in the ass in a museum.  Didn’t matter which answer was correct, Darcy didn’t respond.

“You’ll see.  I guarantee that within an hour you’ll want to pull your hair out.  He looks at every piece of art, and I don’t mean glances.  I mean that every piece of art he sees gets a couple of minutes so that he can look at the light composition and the texture of the paint and he will talk about it incessantly.”

“He’s passionate.”  Darcy still didn’t turn around to face him, though she could see what he was talking about.  “But I’m sure it isn’t gonna be as bad as you remember.”

They were both wrong about the day.  First, Steve was so much worse than James had described.  And second, Darcy was ready to tear her hair out 20 minutes in when Steve was still in the first room with artwork and Darcy had already circulated through all of the adjoining rooms. 

She fell onto a bench next to James.  “How is he like this?”

He continued watching Steve as he got up close and personal to the artwork.  “Many people have spent many years trying to answer that question.”

“Bucky, Darcy, you have to come here the brushwork is exquisite.” 

Darcy and James turned to each other and James rolled his eyes and Darcy countered by crossing hers.  They both laughed at each other before pushing themselves off the bench to look at a relatively inane feature of the painting. 

Steve was oblivious to their antics behind his back, and recited a portion of the history of what he knew about the artist and the piece that he was looking at.  He had to know something was up due to his hearing, but apparently knew both of them well enough to let it slide, because playing the adult wasn’t going to work very well for him.  Not if he liked having the company. 

Finally, they moved on to the next room.  Steve would walk up to a painting and start to talk about what made it special.  Darcy would interrupt to make up a ridiculous backstory for the subject of the painting and Steve would try really hard not to get frustrated with her while James would laugh and add startling details. 

They would stop in front of a painting which featured two couples, one in the forefront and one playing underneath a tree.  Steve would start talking about the paint that was used and the emotion you could see.  Darcy would break in that the two couples lived next door to each other and had decided to have a picnic together before breaking out the wine and having an orgy.  The tips of Steve’s ears would go red and he would continue with his comments as if anyone else were listening.  James would take a second to listen to Steve and then casually mention, they have five children between the four of them and nobody quite knows which belongs to which father.

There was a painting of two naked women casually lounging on a white tablecloth.  At this point in the day, Steve had given up trying to educate them and was just silently thinking about the works of art. 

Darcy mused, “Looks like college.” Which got a shocked laugh out of both men.

“What college did you go to, I might want to visit.”  James said, smirking at her.

“It was an all-girls college.  No boys allowed.”  Darcy smirked back.  “I learned a lot there.” 

Steve’s ears crept up around his shoulders and Darcy received a flash of a memory that he had been pretty much the only man traveling with a troupe of women during the war. 

“I’ll have you know, I am very good at sneaking into dorms under the watchful eye of dorm mothers.”

“Are you now?”

“On multiple continents even.”  Darcy gave a faux-impressed look and leaned in,

“Can you, can you please stop?”  Steve at this point was staring so hard at the plaque on the wall describing the piece that it was surprising that it hadn’t started to blush under his scrutiny. 

Darcy and James looked at each other.  Darcy couldn’t speak for James but her sides hurt from trying to keep the laughter from bursting out.  As ridiculous and her and James had been with their back and forth, there were other people in the library who might not appreciate their sense of humor, or the way she was bursting to guffaw. 

“Sure thing Steve.  Just one question.”

“No.”  It was a definitive answer, which made it that much harder not to laugh.

Steve finally got the upper hand once they ended up in the cubist portion of MOMA.  Oddly enough the same painter who had painted the swinging couple was in the room, but it was a little bit more difficult to make fun of something so disjointed. 

She and James were yet again sitting on a bench, watching Steve look at art.  “I think I can see three different noses on this piece?”  Darcy asked.

“At least you can find something.  I know that this is artists trying to imagine what seeing in additional physical dimensions would be like, but I just don’t get it.” 

Darcy looked at him surprised.  “I didn’t know that.”

“Spending time with Steve in museums is good for something.” 

“I heard that,” Steve through over his shoulder.

James smiled and bumped his shoulder, the metal one, into hers.  She smiled back and let the not so great parts of the afternoon wash over her.  She might not have the constitution to keep up with Steve’s level of attention to artwork, but what she had going on that day wasn’t all that bad. 

At the end of the surprisingly exhausting day, James walked her back to her apartment.  The weather was just starting to turn and it wouldn’t be long before they couldn’t enjoy the crisp fall air anymore.  It was a long enough walk that when they arrived back at Darcy’s apartment she invited him up, sparing only a quick thought as to whether or not she had properly cleaned any time in the past week.

At this point, it wouldn’t matter that much though, James understood her lackadaisical approach to a number of things.  He was always cleaning up after her in his apartment (though it had finally started to look lived in and not just because he had gotten a little bit more lax about immediately cleaning up dishes from dinner – he had asked Steve to paint something for his walls and the various knick-knacks were added to so that it wasn’t just things that came from a catalog). 

She waved hello to her doorman, and practically pulled James into the elevator.  “Sorry about that James,”  she had grabbed his metal hand which had seemed to make him uncomfortable so long ago.  “Mr. Rodriguez is the biggest gossip in the building and he and Ms. Adeleshku from upstairs constantly seem like they’re trying to set me up on another blind date.” 

She noticed him frown, but shrugged it off.  He had spent the day joking around and frankly seeming more open than he normally did and it would make sense for that to lead into a little bit of a backslide. 

Unlocking her apartment, she let her eyes run over everything and sighed in relief that all the dirty laundry was in the hamper and that she hadn’t left anything incriminating out.

She waved James to a chair while she grabbed him a glass for water.

“Why did you apologize?” He asked as she was pulling out a glass from a high cabinet. 

Pulling down her shirt, she answered, “Having me touch your arm seems to make you uncomfortable.”  She filled the glass up with tap water and walked the four steps to her tiny table to give him the glass. 

She smiled extra brightly at him, trying to will away the weird feeling that was creeping up on her apartment.  She could see the way he scanned the room and almost wanted to know what he thought.  Then again, the possible judgement could be harsh and she didn’t want to know he thought badly of her. 

The contract might have started out purely for his benefit (and paying off her student loans) but with how much time they had been spending together, Darcy was starting to think that she didn’t want it to end.  Their friendship was real now, and it was started to seem even crueler that she was still making him pay. 

“I don’t mind you touching my arm…”  He halted and paused.  Hesitant in a way that he hadn’t been since the early months he added, “Normally it seems to make people nervous,”  which explained why he had an extravagant collection of gloves, a lot of long sleeved shirts and ACE bandages he would pull out occasionally (when people asked he would just say he had skin grafts that needed a bit more time to heal).  “I don’t like making people nervous.”

“Well, frankly Barnes.  You have one damn fine piece of machinery attached to you and I’d love to get a closer look.” 

He pulled away and Darcy took a step back.  “Not yet.  Stark… Tony is designing a new one.  One that wasn’t built by the Russians, and that one, that one you can look at.” 

One the one hand Darcy should probably have been paying attention to the slightly ashamed look on James’ face.  Like the arm had been his fault, as if he hadn’t tried hard enough to keep it from doing everything it had done for the past few years.  As if the arm itself was the Winter Solider, and casting it away for a new one would remove the stigma he had lived with for so long.

But she couldn’t focus on that.  It had finally clicked.  The code that she had been working on.  She mentally scanned some of the directives and realized that she had been looking into the coding for the Winter Soldiers new arm. 

Obviously that information was top secret, which meant that she couldn’t actually talk to anyone about it.  Except for Jane, Jane would understand.

But that would be an issue for tomorrow.  “Whatever you want James.”  Finally, knowing about the vulnerability of his future arm (what with all the coding errors she had been finding) she was finally brave enough to broach the subject.  “I’ve been wanting to talk to you for a bit about the contract.  I think we should end it.”

“No.”  He started, forcefully putting down the glass.  Water sloshed over the sides and given how much he had already consumed that was a bit startling.  “What about your student loans.  And this apartment has a doorman, that can’t be cheap.”

“I’ve actually gotten a fairly good head start on my student loans, and with…” she was going to talk about the promotion.  Why he was acting so freaked out that she just wanted him to stop paying her to hang out, she didn’t know.  It wasn’t like she expected they would stop seeing each other, and he already paid for so much of the food, or the transportation home… She had only written the contract as a short term stop gap anyway.

She had never dreamed that she would end up enjoying the Winter Soldier’s company.  And yet she did.  Even with color high up on his cheeks and his hair hanging down in front of his eyes, eyes that had darkened as they stared at her. 

“The contract is fine as it is.”  He stated.  Standing up, he walked around her and put his glass in the sink.  Tentatively, he pulled her into a hug, the first that he had actually initiated.  Happily, she hugged him back. 

It wasn’t clear what his outbreak was about, but she wasn’t going to question the hug.  Warmth enveloped her, and that was a rare enough experience that she just sighed and leaned into him.

“Thank you for the water.  I’ll see you next week.”  And he left.  The door closed and she was left confused, standing in the middle of her apartment.


	16. Friends Have Your Back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy deals with some not-so-fun realities.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi All! I'm managing a Saturday Update! It's been a big week, I put in my two weeks notice on Monday so that's going to be a fun transition. I'm planning on keeping the same update schedule. 
> 
> Have a great rest of the weekend and Happy December!

Thanking god, and Jane’s vehemence at keeping her friends close, Darcy waltzed up to the laboratory level to visit Jane for lunch. 

Bringing two lunches; one tuna sandwich for Jane and ham and cheese for Darcy, was always the right way to butter Jane up.  Or at the least the best way to steal Jane from science for a few minutes.

The lab was starting to look better and better.  The machines hadn’t all been set up yet, and frankly couldn’t be.  So many of them required open air.  Between Jane and SI, there would be an answer it just hadn’t been agreed upon yet.  Though, Darcy did have an inkling that one of the upstate facilities would be adding on an ‘astrophysicists tower’ just for Jane. 

Even with a larger budget, Darcy had to pull Jane away from duct taping just one more piece of equipment back together.

“Jane do you have a privacy setting in here?”

Jane looked to the ceiling and Darcy followed her gaze and saw nothing other than normal ceiling tiling.  Frankly, the ceiling looked like the ceiling in her high school.  So many fond memories of laying down in the nurse’s office trying to make patterns of the dots.

“Jarvis, could you enact the privacy setting on my lab right now?”

“Of course, Miss Foster.”

Darcy startled, “What the fuck was that?”

Jane looked back up at the ceiling, “Stark created some kind of program to run the building.  It’s pretty helpful.”  She turned back to Darcy, “What did you want to talk to me about.”

Darcy was still staring at the ceiling.  Having worked at SI for over five months she had kind of assumed the building didn’t have any more secrets.  Finding out that the fifth floor kitchen always has donuts seemed like the craziest thing that was going to happen. 

She knew she shouldn’t, but she kind of wanted to see how far down the rabbit hole went with this Jarvis program.  And she would, even though it would probably get her in trouble.  But now was not the time.  There were other things she needed to talk through.

Taking in a deep breath, she forced out, “I think the programming I’m working on is a new arm for James and I feel like there’s some sort of conflict of interest in me working on it, and I’m a little worried that I’m not going to catch everything and his arm is going to be wonky and it’s going to be all my fault.”

The only thing to stop her tirade was Jane’s hands gently pressing down on her shoulders.  “Darcy breathe.”  Darcy took a shaky breath in and out.  “Even if you are working on a new cybernetic arm, if they’re having your review the coding and they’re finding blips it’s going to be delayed.”

Darcy dropped her head into her hands, “but he’s so excited to get a new arm.  The one he has seems like it has so many horrible memories.”

Drolly, Jane said, “Pretty sure he’d be willing to wait for an arm that doesn’t malfunction.  So he doesn’t accidentally strangle himself.”

Darcy let out a shaky laugh, “So far it doesn’t look like that’s the plan.  Mostly just an emp.”

The shocked expression on Jane’s face disappeared so quickly that Darcy didn’t see it. 

“That doesn’t sound like a coder’s honest mistake?”

“It’s not,”  Darcy wiped her eyes with the sleeves of her blazer.  A blazer could make any shirt look work appropriate, and with her chest, she needed the help.  “I’m talking to Alba and she’s working some magic to figure out who’s been slipping in the code.”

“So, you aren’t alone on this project, even if you aren’t supposed to know what you’re working on?”  Darcy nodded, “And they’ve removed the normal IT phone calls from your work load?”  Darcy nodded again, “Then you’ll be able to give this your full attention, and considering you know what the program is now, you’re going to do the best you can do.”

Looking up at Jane, there was an obvious question, “Where is this part of you normally?”

Taken aback, Jane asked, “What do you mean?”

“How is it that I have a life-changing problem and you make everything okay in five minutes, but I can’t get you to eat or sleep on a regular basis?”

“I can eat or sleep at any time, I can’t always help you out.”  Jane said bluntly, mind already clearly back on her project.  “Besides, science gets me back to getting some on the regular, we all know that’s a good thing for the world.” 

Darcy sniffled a laugh but couldn’t disagree.  Back when Jane and ‘Donald the doctor’ were together, when things were going okay, Jane’s output went through the roof.  It was probably because Jane was getting a decent amount of sleep after getting a little fun on.  Once he was out of the picture, Jane still got shit done, just a little grumpier, which meant things tended to break. 

“Plus, that’s not actually my job anymore.”  Darcy added, pulling the wrench out of Jane’s hand and pushing a sandwich into it.  “Which completely explains why I’m up her pushing food on you.” 

Smiling fondly, she took a big bite of her sandwich.  “ooh, is this tuna?  Mmm, there’s celery in there.”

“Yes Jane, I found a sandwich place that puts celery in their tuna salad.  Just for you, you lunatic.” 

Mouth full of tuna, Jane smiled again, “We need to do another girls night.” 

“God, yes.  I need to blow off some steam.”

“I can bring my new assistant…”  Jane mused, while Darcy squawked ‘you replaced me?’ “and maybe we can invite Natasha too, though I’m not sure…”

“Yes, invite Natasha.  She uses the card Tony Stark gave her to pay for all the drinks!”

She high-fived Jane on her way out of the lab, overhearing a faint, “You can turn the privacy protocols off now Jarvis.” 

In the elevator she pushed the stop button.  “Jarvis, are you there?”  The stage-whisper made everything seem more covert.

“Yes Ms. Lewis.  May I help you with something?”

“How long have you been here?”

“Since the building was first finished Ms. Lewis.”

“And you watch everyone in the building?”

“For Mr. Stark’s safety, yes.”

“Do you know who is adding in the code?”

At this, the disembodied voice sounded… frustrated.  “No Ms. Lewis.  I cannot tell why but I have been trouble accessing that particular information.”

This gave Darcy two pieces of information.  First, whoever was adding in the malicious code was good, though not good enough to make their code subtle.  Second, the computer program was far more sophisticated than Jane, and probably everyone else was meant to believe.

“Jarvis, are you…”  how to word this, “could you…”  how to not piss off a program of unspecified limitations and means while also importing an important message, “I don’t know how deep you are into… everything.  But until we figure out who is messing with the code I’m working on can you help me halt it’s implementation?”

There was a long pause.  A pause where the thing was thinking!  Which, holy shit.  The computer program wasn’t just processing, she had made a request of something so outlandish that any normal program would end up with an error message.

“I will attempt to help you.”

Sagging against the side of the elevator, she sighed. 

“Will that be all Ms. Lewis?”

Her hand was already outstretched with a no on her lips before she realized something.  “Do many people talk to you?”

“A satisfactory number of people recognize my existence.”

A non-answer.  Figures, “Would it be okay if I talked to you?  After hours only, of course.  Don’t want anybody to think I’m crazy.”

“I’m not sure the addition to you speaking to yourself would cause that to happen unless they were already inclined to think in such a manner.”

Of course, the AI had to be a little shit too.  “I’ll talk to you tomorrow night then.”  She said slightly reluctantly.  While it was a good idea to not piss off a program that had too much power, it would be a bit irritating to have someone else snark at her. 

Back at her desk, she popped in her headphones and tried to ignore the weight of the knowledge she now bore. 

It was almost a relief to go to self-defense that night.  Almost, because while Darcy desperately wanted to relieve some tension by punching the shit out of things there was still the matter of the running.  Also the fact that she may have insulted Steve’s best friend within the last week and was trying to make sure the code for his new cybernetic arm didn’t kill him.  No pressure right.

She walked in and was surprised to see that Steve wasn’t there, instead it was Natasha and Sam.  “We figured you could use a break from Mr. Serious.”  Sam smiled.

“Oh thank god.”  Darcy sagged.  Taking a few minutes to change into the yoga pants, two sports bras, and raggedy shirt that she used to work out in, she returned to find mats all over the floor. 

“Well this is all a little alarming…”  She said into an empty room.  As she walked further in, it became even more clear that there was no one there.  For fucks sake, the sound of the heater was audible.  Spinning in a cautious circle didn’t make anything more clear. 

Her right hand twitched and she wished that she hadn’t left her taser in her bag.  Normally workouts with Natasha were a little bit of strength training and learning moves that could incapacitate someone long enough for her to run away. 

This workout was turning into a game of the world’s scariest hide and go seek.  If Darcy hadn’t known Natasha better she would have been a little worried that she was in a remake of Saw. 

She heard a whoosh above her and looked up.  Falcon, because Sam was wearing his wings and it was rare that she was able to use code names, was hovering above her head.

“So what exactly is the point of this?”  She yelled up at him.

Suddenly an arm grabbed her shoulder, and she was on the ground.  Natasha stood above her, looking deadly even in her tank top and worn pants.  “Trying to get you to pay attention to your surroundings.”

“Not fair, you don’t make any sound when you move.”

She shrugged off the complaint, “You were still distracted by Sam.”

He landed next to her, “Sorry about the game of cat and mouse, Natasha made me promise not to say anything.”

“You’re no longer my favorite quasi-Avenger, Sam!”

“Ouch?”  His tone of voice made it clear that her curse didn’t really matter.  And why should it, at the time he was really the only quasi-Avenger.  Everyone else was full time, or James.  And part of her wished that he would take himself off the “Avenger hopeful” list anyway.

“All I wanted was to hit things today.”  She moaned, still staring at the ceiling. 

Natasha held out a perfectly manicured hand and pulled her to her feet.  “You’re welcome to try to hit things after you’ve caught us.”  Darcy sighed but knew that there was no fighting that.  Steve was willing to work around what she wanted.  Natasha seemed like she knew what was best and couldn’t be swayed unless it seemed like Darcy was physically incapable of fulfilling it at the moment. 

Over the night, she spent so much time wandering around an otherwise silent building.  Attempting to find Natasha and Sam was nearly impossible.  Natasha was deadly quiet and Sam had 3-dimensions to work in. 

Basically, Darcy didn’t get a hit on anyone all night long.

And, she ended the night twitchy from having been snuck up on so many times.  Once Natasha was finally willing to call it a night, Darcy angrily grabbed her bag and stalked towards the exit.

“Are you okay?”  Sam asked.  He was standing next to the doorway.

“Fucking peachy.”  She growled, shoving her arms through her coat sleeves.  “If you guys jump out at me on my way home, know I already have my taser prepped.”

Same opened his mouth to say something, but Natasha beat him to it, “The training is for your own good.” 

“Well I’m not training to be a super solider and I’m not training to be in the field so right now I just had two people I thought were my friends jump out and seem to enjoy scaring the living shit out of me.  So I’m sorry if I don’t appreciate your ‘help.’” Full  on finger quotes with the ‘help’ and Darcy was out of there. 

The evening had made her twitchy enough that she actually had her taser in her hand all the way home. 

Pushing open the door to her apartment, she finally let the tears fall.

It had been a long stressful week and the last thing she had needed was to be snuck up on for two hours.  She had held it together pretty well, but back in the space that was completely her own and as safe as she could make it, she didn’t want to hold in the negative emotions anymore.  Playing some sad music and curling up in a ball worked for about 15 minutes.

After that, she needed to get some shit done.  So, even though it was past 11pm, she grabbed her computer and logged on to her network.  She had a few questions as to how to track a malicious coder.  If this person had outsmarted her, and outsmarts whatever ingenious and possibly devious program Tony Stark had created, she wanted to source some information.  As always, her friends had her back.


	17. Two Degrees From Normal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's more than one kind of bug.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy the chapter! Sorry it's a little bit later than normal. It's been an exhausting weekend. Let me know what you think.

She started to work even crazier hours.  The amount of coding she had to look through for this project was ridiculous, and the few times she backtracked to check something she had already looked at the malicious code was back.

Finally, Alba gave her permission to work remotely, and to download the program to a computer that wasn’t connected to the internet or the intranet.  It was starting to seem like that was the only way to protect it.  The biggest problem was that the creator, Tony Stark, was still updating the code as he went.  Like Sisyphus pushing the rock uphill only to have it roll downhill overnight, her battle was pretty much endless.

The nice thing, was that with everything on a protected laptop, she could finally work remote. Which meant that she declared that she and James needed a Lord of the Rings marathon session. 

She had seen the movies enough that they wouldn’t distract her, and given James’ apparent love for Tolkein he very clearly needed to watch them.

She sprawled on his couch, back resting up against the arms rest, feet delicately pillowed in James’ lap.

He was completely engrossed in the movie as she finally reached a midway point.  Leaving her cursor blinking, she moved her computer to the coffee table and finally stretched out her neck.  They were deep into the second movie and James was smiling at Treebeard interacting with the hobbits. 

It was such a soft and unexpected smile that it threw her for a loop.  “More popcorn?”  She asked, quickly getting up.  If she moved around she wouldn’t have to think about whatever was happening in her life. 

That policy may have gotten her through a lot of things but it was starting to get very tiresome.  The kitchen looked much the same, still ridiculously neat, although he had finally invested in an air popper so nothing would have to be made on the stove.  While everything was neat, clean, and in it’s place, there was clearly more stuff there than there had been.  The air popper had been joined by a crock pot and food processor.  Darcy knew for a fact that James owned more pots and pans than she had in her entire life combined.  It was impressive considering she had never actually seen him cook.  Maybe it was just a hobby, and there were worse hobbies to have.  At least he wasn’t collecting guns (that she knew of) like Natasha did. 

That sent a shiver down her spine.  It was juvenile but she couldn’t shake the anger she had over what the other night had turned into.  There had been no warning, there hadn’t been a break through the entire thing, and Natasha had been smiling far too much.  Sam at least, had seemed like he felt a little bit guilty.  It was hard, continuing to feel angry, because she knew what Natasha was going for.

In a situation where she was being attacked or getting kidnapped, there wouldn’t be any forewarning.  But there was a right way to go about a situation and a wrong way.  It might have been juvenile, but Darcy wasn’t willing to let that hurt go quite yet. 

Kernels popped and popped, and finally slowed down.  Darcy pulled a bowl down from the cabinet and poured the popcorn in before liberally covering everything in the shredded Parmesan cheese in the fridge (she knew James kept it just for her) and coating everything in cayenne pepper.  It was the only way to keep everyone else from eating the whole bowl in under 5 minutes.  Neither Steve not Bucky were particularly good with spicy foods.

Darcy handed the bowl to James and returned to her spot on the sofa.  It was a comfortable way to spend the day.  She managed to get through a large chunk of code, benefiting from not having Alba and Brad hovering over her all day.  Brad still hadn’t gotten the message that ‘Natalie’ wasn’t interested, and Darcy wasn’t willing to deal with that drama at the moment.

Besides, they had the extended versions of all the movies.  It was a long day.  Although there were plentiful breaks at her favorite points in the movies, which helped bolster her for the rest of the day. 

At the point the movies were finished it was pretty late.  She finished shutting down her computer and started packing her bag.  “Do you want to stay here overnight?”

A quick chuckle before answering, “You’re a lot smoother than Steve was when he asked the question… Yeah, though.  That would be nice.  Taxis are freaking expensive.”

He frowned, “I thought I was paying for your transportation?”

Oh shit, he hadn’t realized she wasn’t charging him for everything anymore.  It had been a gradual drop off.  First the taxis, then some of her food, then all of her food (even what she brought for their dinners), she had already gotten the point where she wasn’t charging for most of their time together.  It didn’t feel right considering she had a job that paid the bills, and he still wasn’t at a point where he felt capable of holding down a job.

Darcy wasn't sure anyone had even mentioned the possibility of work to him.  There hadn’t been any fugue states or violent outbursts for the longest time, but nobody else they knew had a normal job.  Darcy was the only exception.  Stark still partially ran his company while also doing his avenging, Natasha still functioned as a spy (though how that paid at this point, Darcy didn’t know), Steve was an artist/Avenger, Sam worked at the VA but had dropped down to part time.  While he knew being an Avenger was important he didn’t want to completely give up working with veterans.  It was a brave move considering his schedule could be a little bit erratic, but he still made time for his guys back in dc, skyping into their group meetings as often as he could. 

“Yeah, but that shit’s still expensive.  Don’t want you wasting your money if you don’t have to.” She quickly said, a slight deception to distract from the fact that she was paying her own bills.

“No time with you is wasted, doll.”  He smirked, and it sent a brief shiver down her spine.  He kept saying things like that and she didn’t know how to react.

“Nice one Sergeant Muscles.”  She joked.  “Could you grab me an extra blanket for the couch?  I should be okay wearing this to sleep.”  Looking down at the sweatpants and baggy t-shirt she knew she would be fine.  It wasn’t that different than her normal sleepwear anyway.

“You should take my bed.”  James offered opening the door to his bedroom.  Darcy hadn’t seen it yet, and while part of her was dying to know how he had decorated it, everything about that was a bad idea.  As soon as she knew what it looked like, her mind could end up in dangerous territory. 

“I’m fine out here, big guy.  This is the most comfortable couch ever.”  The hyperbole wasn’t appreciated.  But there was no beating her when she was determined, a fact that James had learned a while back. 

Armed with a handful of blankets and what she had deemed the squishiest sofa cushion, Darcy curled up on the couch and was almost immediately out.

It was the disorienting kind of sleep, the kind where waking up feels like coming into a nightmare.  In the middle of the night she startled awake.  The calming breaths she had practiced as a child came in handy, though it still took her a few minutes to realize where she was.  Even with the streetlamps below, the apartment was dim and she could barely make out the rest of the furniture.

Fully awake, she tried to find out what woke her up.  Clearly, light wasn’t the problem, and neither was the sofa.  It was pretty comfortable, and even if her neck didn’t completely agree with the assessment, she wasn’t in enough discomfort to have woken her up.

A muffled noise came from James’ bedroom.  That must have been it.  Living in DC for a while and New York for a few months still hadn’t fixed her of her light sleeping habits.  Firetrucks blazing through her neighborhood still woke her at odd hours and whenever there was a particularly raucous crowd of people walking down the street, she would know.

But, the sound was slight enough that normally it wouldn’t have been a problem.

What was a problem was that it sounded like James was having a bad night.  Darcy was torn; part of her wanted to run into the bedroom to wake him up, maybe talk about what was wrong.  The other part of her knew that there was still a barrier between them.  A barrier she wasn’t comfortable crossing.

There was nothing wrong with being friends, and spending a lot of time together.  But in NO WAY would she allow her attraction to him impede his recovery process.  It had been hard enough to get him to the point where he was willing to ask for things like going swing dancing, or to attend a concert. 

Going into his bedroom would mean that she would see how he sleeps, and what he holds closest to him.  All information that she didn’t need to know in order to be a good friend to him. 

Rationalizing everything in her mind, she knew they were all just excuses.  She wanted to help him, but knew that there would be no positive long term outcome. 

For about 15 minutes, she sat curled up in his blankets, listening to the sounds of him fighting his own mind.  Her only solace was the fact that she was monitoring everything to make sure nothing escalated.  After those 15 minutes, he settled down, but it took her a while to tamp down the part of her that was screaming that she was a bad friend for not trying to help. 

In the morning her alarm went off and she poked her head out of the blankets.  James was already in the kitchen, dressed for the day and apparently freshly showered. 

“Coffee?”  He asked.

She groaned out a yes and stumbled to the bathroom to get herself ready.  The mirror was unfortunate.  Her makeup had smeared and she was still in sweats though she knew she would have to actually go into work. 

Walking back into the kitchen she smiled tiredly at James as he handed her the coffee he had made her.  There was a buttload of sugar in it, just the way she liked it.  “Thanks,” she murmured before downing half the coffee in two gulps.  It burned on its way down, but she desperately needed it. 

She took a moment to look at him.  He didn’t look weary, or tired the way she expected after hearing his interrupted sleep.  “How did you sleep?” 

He looked up sharply from the vegetables he was chopping for an omelet.  “Fine.”  Hands deftly went back to chopping. 

There was no point in pushing when he looked so defensive.  Eyes didn’t move from his hands and every muscle was tense.  He wouldn’t be willing to open up. 

Finishing her coffee in two more gulps, she mentally shrugged.  “Thanks for the coffee.  I’ve got to run home to change.  Pretty sure Alba would freak if I showed up in this.”  She waved a hand dramatically over her grungy sweats. 

She gave him a quick hug and then left.

 

The rest of the day was spent slaving over a hot computer.  Her headphones were plugged into her computer and it was shock the first time she heard Jarvis interrupt her music.  After calming down her racing heart, she tried to figure out how to talk back to the Jarvis. 

Typing wasn’t the best option and she was excited and a little scared to realize that Javis could hear her even when she muttered under her breath.  It might make her look a little bit crazy but most of her coworkers already thought she was a little bit eccentric based off of how much attention she was giving this project of hers.  Besides, no one was quite close enough to overhear her conversation. 

Mostly it was a few suggestions as to how to find out how the malicious code was getting into the program.  Though, at some point Darcy realized that they were just keeping up a conversation.  It was strange to be speaking with a computer program that was so smooth, and had such a lack of limitations.

She didn’t bother to ask if it… he… was an AI.  Thinking about a world that already had an AI was scary enough, she didn’t need to think about one in Tony Stark’s hands.  Though, to be fair to the man, it seemed like Jarvis had been around for a while and hadn’t gone crazy.  Plus Tony had done a lot to redeem his image in the past years.

But the days were long and she wasn’t easily distracted.  She stayed at work until 8pm every night, and went to visit James after that, normally just to watch an episode or two of a tv show, or to continue working while James read a book and listened to music. 

James’ taste in books had become clear.  He didn’t mind reading history, but preferred books that detailed strategy.  It had seemed strange that a man who tried so desperately to leave parts of his bloody past behind was so willing to delve into military tactics, but it wasn’t her place to say anything.  His taste in fiction was questionable too.  Harry Potter had been introduced to him fairly early on; the early books didn’t have anything particularly questionable.  That had not gone over well.  It wasn’t that he didn’t like them, he just didn’t see the point.  Darcy tried other series of books and didn’t have any luck until she introduced him to Game of Thrones. 

He had read through the first two books in almost no time, and he and Darcy were slowly catching up with the show. 

The second time that she stayed at James’ place, he asked if she wanted to leave some clothes so she wouldn’t have stop at home before work.  She shrugged and said, sure.  It would be a quite a time saver, after all.

Besides, he asked during Game of Thrones and she just wanted to get back to watching Ned Stark make bad long-term decisions.

She worked straight through the weekend, there hadn’t been much planned anyway.  On Monday, the clock ticked over to 6:30 pm, when it was time to head to the gym for training.  Remembering the last week, she ignored the time and kept on working. 

Once she was done for the night, she shut down her computer, said goodbye to Jarvis and went home to eat cold Chinese food and not talk to anyone for a few hours. 

The rest of the week went the same way.  She worked all day, and then went to spend time with James, reminding her why she was putting in the crazy hours.

Another week passed, and James finished with the Game of Thrones book and Darcy took him to the library to let him choose what was next.  He came back with a few particularly long science fiction novels “Steve and I loved these back in the day.”  She flipped through them. 

“Go grab Ender’s Game, Dune, Farenheit 451 and Brave New World.”

“I’ve read Brave New World.”

“Did you read 1984 too?”

He shook his head, “Grab that one, we can talk about the differing ideas of dystopian futures and which is more likely.”

He smiled and nodded.  “Quite a pile you’re giving me.”

She shrugged, “If you can read the G.R.R. Martin tomes as quickly as you did, I’m sure we’ll be here again next week.”  She went back to browsing through the various titles in the Romance section.  “Take one of these too,” she joked, “might open your eyes.” 

He picked one up, scanned the back cover, and gave an amused smirk.  “Sounds like it might be right up my alley.”

“Depending on what you picked up, literally.”

 

She skipped another self-defense class.  Her phone had been buzzing fairly consistently and while she had apologized to Steve for the last one, she had pointedly not been answering the text messages from Natasha and Sam.

By Thursday, Jane was convincing her to eat.  Darcy had just been given a new portion of code to work on and was working on a program that would do a side by side comparison of the various versions to see when the malicious code had been added.

The whole situation was starting to get a little bit absurd.  There were, maybe 15 different version of the code on her computer and the code wasn’t in every version she was getting.  It was like somebody had managed to add in code, removed it in the next version, and then added a slightly different code into the next version.

“Darcy, you need to eat.”  Darcy rubbed her eyes.  It was hard to believe that she had gotten bad enough that Jane, FREAKING JANE, thought she needed to come out of the hole she lived in.

Suddenly she realized how crappy she felt.  The late nights and living mostly off of vending machine food clearly wasn’t doing her any good.  She stood up and swayed slightly.  The sad thing is that it was hard to tell if that was due to the junk food, the lack of sleep, the fact that she hadn’t stood up in (she checked the clock) six hours, or that along with the headache she felt a case of the sniffles coming on.

“What did you have in mind?”  She grabbed a tissue from the ever-present office box (Janine was always worried about germs).

Jane looked at her, “Are you okay?”

“Just peachy, Jane.”  She groused. 

“Indian food?  My treat.”

Darcy perked up at that, “A buffet?”

“Is there any other kind of lunch at and Indian restaurant?”

They walked a few blocks out and were quickly seated in the silent restaurant.  Darcy took the side of the table that was quasi-booth while Jane was stuck with the pretty, though uncomfortable looking, chair. 

“Darcy, I’m a little…” 

Darcy held up her hand.  “Jane, I promise I’ll listen to you but food comes first.” Jane sighed but acquiesced.

Once their plates were loaded; Jane got a little bit of everything, Darcy stuck with her favorites, Darcy finally gave Jane the go-ahead nod.  “You need to take a break.”

Eyes focused on Jane, Darcy slowly stuffed her mouth full of naan and raised an eyebrow.

“I know its hypocritical coming from me… but Steve agrees.”  Another eyebrow raised, “Okay we aren’t the best examples… But if we’re worried that means something, right?”

She had a point there.  Once the workaholics being to think that a workload is crazy, they’re probably right. 

She swallowed noisily.  “What do you want me to do?  The code keeps popping up and someone needs to look at this code.”

“Aren’t there other people in your office?”

“Of course there are, but someone needs to handle the idiots and clearly it isn’t me.”

Jane smiled at that, she had heard the stories.  Plus, knowing Darcy for quite a time, completely understood Darcy’s ability to mock anyone and everyone when they deserved it.

After one plate Darcy was done.  A fact that was only interesting because normally Darcy would eat two plates and then grab a third to pick at because the food was so good and she wanted to eat it but was too full to.  She looked sadly at the desserts, but knew that her body didn’t want, and couldn’t handle, one at the moment.

“Now,”  Jane started as they headed back to the Tower, “What is happening between you and Natasha?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” Darcy mumbled the way a small child does, while kicking a pebble down the sidewalk.  It was the epitome of juvenile but Darcy couldn’t help it.  She also couldn’t help the look that Jane gave her.  The look said, I know I’m not your mother but you will tell me things when I ask you to or I will find a way to send you to another dimension.  And the threat was real considering Jane was already trying to open up a portal to alien lands. “Fine.”  Darcy threw her hands in the air and gesticulated wildly.  “Look, I was having a really shitty time, and instead of picking up on it like the super spy that she was, she ignored the fact that what she was doing had passed the point of being helpful and continued to scare the shit out of me an knock me on my ass.  And…”  This was the big point, “she made her boyfriend help.  So I had two people ganging up to sneak up on me and…”  She let her voice fade away.

She didn’t want to explain to Jane how weak she was: the way her hands had shook on the way home.  The way the shadows seemed particularly intent on hiding something sinister.  It was stupid and it was weak and it wasn’t okay.  Not in her life.  Instead, she just clenched her fists and tried to hold the anger inside.  Bitching to Jane wasn’t going to make anything better.

“And, and it wasn’t some sort of modified game night?”  Jane asked hesitantly.  It wasn’t often that Darcy got as visibly upset as she was in the moment.  Even more rare that it happened in public.

“It was one of my self-defense classes.  Steve apparently couldn’t make it and Natasha thought it would be good to prepare me to have someone sneak up on me,” her tone was about as flat as it could go.

Snaking her arm through Darcy’s, Jane frowned, “I’m gonna figure out something to fix this.”

Shoulders drooped as Darcy offered a, “Don’t worry about it, I’ll get over it eventually.  Just with everything that’s going on, I didn’t want to have to deal with it.” 

Darcy went straight back to work, and at the time she was leaving, was starting to feel fuzzy.  Not wrong, exactly, but 2 degrees off from normal.  Hoping a good nights’ sleep would solve the problem, she dragged herself into bed and curled up in a ball.

The next morning she thought she would regret not having eaten dinner but she was still not hungry.  Her head was throbbing.  “Mind if I work at your place?”  She texted James, before calling Alba and letting her know she would be teleworking that day. 

The response from James was instantaneous.  “Heading to the gym.  You know where the key is, let yourself in.” 

She put up her hair and took a quick shower before putting on her lazy day outfit: leggings and a long, loose, belted Henley dress.  Once she had her laptop she was ready to go.  She walked outside into the crisp weather and knew she wasn’t up to taking the subway and hailed a cab. 

It was the right idea when, as she arrived at James’s building, her head had upgraded from throbbing to pounding.  She let herself into the apartment and immediately went for the mild painkillers that he kept in the kitchen.  She downed two and dropped onto her unofficial spot on the couch. 

She called Alba one more time, “I’m not sure how much work I’m actually going to be able to get done today.  I’m really sick.”  Alba gave her permission to take a day off, “You’ve gotten more than enough overtime as it is.” 

With that done, she slowly stood up, waiting a second for her head to stop spinning and closed the blinds.  Falling back onto the couch she pulled her blanket off the back and considered going back home.  It wasn’t fair to James to make him take care of her. 

Unfortunately, her head floated away from her before she could do anything.  James woke her from her stupor.  It took one look at her cocoon and flushed face before he realized. 

“You got sick.”

She sniffed, “Yeah, sorry, I should go home.”

“Where there’s no one to watch you?  I don’t think so, stay there,  I’ll get you some soup.”

Feeling as badly as she was, there was no possible argument.  She flopped around for the remote and went to put on some mindless television.  She had to switch the channel from CNN, and mentally grumped at James for not liking history books but loving watching the news.  She flipped between a couple of shows and landed on Say Yes to The Dress. 

As it was the middle of the day, most of the tv was garbage and she didn’t want to expose James to anything too ridiculous. 

After two episodes had started and finished she turned to face the kitchen.  James was standing at the stove, sauteing celery, onion, and carrots. “What’re you doing?”

“Making soup… What are you watching?”  Darcy looked back at the tv, as a reminder.

“Quality television where bitchy women try to find an overpriced wedding gown.  Why didn’t you just grab a can?”

He scoffed, “A lot of things have improved over time, but nothing is better than homemade chicken noodle soup.  If I had more time, I would have made chicken stock but I used the last of mine a week or two ago.”

Darcy’s eyes got huge, “You know how to cook?”

He stirred the pot and put the lid on, and put some water on to boil for the noodles.  “I’m from a time before takeout was invented.  And I was poor.  And Steve got sick all the time.  I can cook the basics.”  He said proudly. 

Darcy thought about the three dishes she could make and had no room to talk.  She couldn’t even make all of the basics.  That was what takeout and pre-prepared food was for after all.  After a few minutes James joined her on the sofa.

“Is that dress translucent?”

“She’s a mob bosses daughter and thinks it’s classy.”  She shifted on the couch to lean up against him.

“Don’t get too comfortable, the noodles will be finished boiling in 6 minutes.”  Darcy shifted back against the armrest and focused on the television, missing the disappointed line of James’ mouth. 

As they watched the show, he started making snippy comments.  Apparently the man had an eye for fashion in the same way that he had an eye for interior decorating.  You wouldn’t know it from looking at him though.  His wardrobe seemed to consist of endless Henley's, all of which seemed like they had started out as bright colors but then added a dark grey cast to them.  And jeans, he seemed to own a number of skinny jeans. 

Part of Darcy just really wanted to see the man in a finely tailored suit.  With arms like his and a general physique, it would all be quite lovely. 

But, he would comment on what the brides seemed to want and how it would or would not flatter their body shape.  He liked complaining about the women with the tear-jerking stories.  “It’s completely created for the show.  Calm the fuck down about your dog not being able to attend your wedding.  It’ll be at the reception!  What has happened in this world?”

Darcy tried to follow his comments but sometimes he talked too quickly and her mind couldn’t catch up.  At the point where a bowl of soup ended up in front of her she was all too happy to have something new to focus on. 

One bite in and she moaned, not being able to care what she sounded like.  “James, James, this is amazing.”

“You’re sick, anything warm would taste good.”  Clear false modesty rang in every syllable. 

She ate not quite ravenously, she never had an appetite when she wasn’t feeling well, but everything about the soup seemed to do her good. 

She tried to invest a little more in the show, but spent most of her time amused at how quickly James understood the true purpose of reality television.  Yelling at strangers for their bad decisions.  “Gonna make you watched Chopped at some point.  It’ll blow your mind.” 

The painkiller was starting to wear off and she rolled off the couch, expecting to land on her feet.

Hands caught her as she gracelessly started to fall.  James gave her a look as he helped her stand.  She slowly but surely made her way to the kitchen to grab more medicine and James followed, leaning up against the counter as she fumbled through his cabinets. 

“You know I could have grabbed those for you?”

“But you were sitting down.”  She said, as if that was reason enough not to ask a favor.  “And you made soup.”

Walking back to the couch was almost beyond her but she made it there and held out her fist for a fist bump. “Just like American Ninja Warrior.”  The name piqued his interest.

“What’s that?”

“Competition,”  She yawned, “ridiculous people do a ridiculous obstacle course thing.”  She yawned again but grabbed the remote.  It had to be on demand, or something.  At the very least it seemed like one of those shows that was always playing.  She pulled up an episode and James was immediately captivated.

Darcy, however, may have fallen asleep.  Because she was asleep she missed dinner.  She also missed the way that James stood in front of the sofa debating whether or not he should give her his bed.

She also missed the way that he bundled her up and gently carried her into his bedroom.  Not wanting to take any liberties, he left her in the dress and leggings but removed the elastic belt, and tucked her under the covers.  The sniffling and slight cough made him think it was the right decision.

All that Darcy knew was that she fell asleep during an episode of American Ninja Warrior and woke up in a strange bedroom.  It wasn’t easy to guess if her reaction would have been better or worse if she hadn’t still felt fuzzy in the head. 

Actually, it would have been worse.  As it was, she struggled for a minute or two with the down comforter, and would have fallen flat on her face except that she exhausted herself and let herself sink into the bed instead.

She looked around for clues as to where she was and deflated when she saw the books on the nightstand.  They were the books they had picked up from the library.  A glance to the other side of the bed showed a few of the strategy books that James favored.  Looking around the entire room was covered in small personal touches.  The kinds of personal touches that it had taken weeks to find out in the living room and kitchen.  There was a charcoal drawing framed on the wall, and judging by the style it was done by Steve.  There was a yellowing picture of what looked like it could be a very young James with his family.  There was a picture from a game night with Darcy, James & Steve almost falling all over each other. 

Other than that, the room was cozy.  Cozier than the living room was now even after months of Darcy sneaking new books and DVD’s and board games on to shelves and doing her best to make it lived in.  Clearly that was the room that was meant to act as an armor.  The bedroom was where he kept his heart. 

She was trying desperately hard not to snoop.  It wasn’t her place, and just because he had put her in his room didn’t mean she had permission to invade his space.  Shutting her eyes, she tried to force herself to go back to sleep, but her body wasn’t having it. 

Finally she pushed herself up and out of bed and went to use the hall bathroom.  She leaned heavily against the wall.  Somehow she was feeling worse than the day before even though she had been in bed for, she checked the clock, something along the lines of 15 hours. 

James was laying on the sofa, engrossed in a book.  “Morning,”  she offered voice hoarse.  Her throat felt like someone was taking a piece of rough sandpaper and running it delicately over her vocal chords.  It would be better not to talk. 

He startled at her voice, which was odd considering normally he would have been aware of her entering a room as soon as it had happened.  Must have been one hell of a book. 

After peeing, which lasted far longer than normal (though normally she didn’t sleep for 15 hours straight), she attempted to stretch her shoulders and gave up.  Facing James should have been hard, she was sure she looked like crap (it was habit not to look in a mirror when she felt bad, no point in reinforcing what she already knew) and was feeling a little bit like roadkill.  But, feeling like roadkill meant she had different priorities than normal. 

“Good book?”  The whisper still sounded shot and did no good to the rest of her, she grimaced and decided to shut the fuck up for a bit.  They would just have to pay charades for a bit.

James suddenly seemed shifty.  Of all the words that could be used to describe James, shifty had never been one of them.  Hesitant, distant, funny, charming, furious, kind, there were a lot of options. 

Darcy didn’t even take a moment to think about it though, stumbling her way over to the couch. 

“I’ll get you some more soup.” 

James was off the couch in an instant.  Darcy took full advantage and snuggled into the couch, lazily looking around for the book that James had been reading.  The green binding wasn't visible from where she was, which was strange considering James usually left whatever he was reading on the table. 

It didn’t really matter all that much, she fumbled for her bag which was still at the base of the couch where she had left it yesterday and pulled out her laptop. 

“Nope.”  James pulled the computer away from her.  “No work today.”

She glared and gave him the finger.  He merely chuckled and went back to the kitchen.  She leaned forward and rapped her knuckles on the table.  When he looked up she put her hands up in the air and waved them around.  It wasn’t clear if her “Then what are we supposed to do” was understandable or if he just happened to be fairly intuitive.

“Netflix?  You mentioned a show you wanted to watch, House of Cards?”

She gave him a big thumbs up and lunged for the remote.  Only to get slightly off balance and slowly slide to the floor.  It was a surprisingly graceful move considering how clumsy she had been since she had woken up.  But James hadn’t noticed so it was no harm no foul.  Plus the remote was right in front of her. 

She pulled the blanket over her shoulders and settled in for a long haul.  Pointing the remote at the tv she brought up Netflix and clicked endlessly until House of Cards was finally on.  Darcy was immediately engrossed, and frankly a little disappointed in how she wasn’t using her Political Science Major. 

Ten minutes into the first episode and a bowl of soup appearing in front of her.  She gave James a smile before returning to her tv show.  The couch depressed behind her and James pulled one leg onto the couch and left the other dangling right next to her.  She nudged his leg with her shoulder and grinned while eating her soup. 

The autoplay function was either brilliant or brutal.  Two and a half episodes had passed before she got the ‘are you still watching’ notification.  She was about to click yes, when she noticed that James was very much not paying attention.  He had Enders Game out and was a good portion into the book.

Considering it was a science fiction classic all about strategy to fight aliens, Darcy had thought he would enjoy it, but he looked distressed.  She tapped him on the knee, and raised an eyebrow.

“These are fucking children.  And they’re preparing them to fight a war?  For fucks sake, Steve and I may have been young and stupid but we weren’t children.  We knew what we were getting involved in.”

With a single finger she tapped her temple three times. 

He looked disgusted.  “Doesn’t matter if they were smart.  Children aren’t emotionally capable of dealing with the repercussions of a situation like this.”

Darcy pulled herself onto the couch and pulled the book away from him.  It was hard enough to get a point across when she didn’t know what point to be making.  Adding in the fact that she’d rather pour boiling water down her throat than talk, made the entire situation just a little bit more complicated. 

She motioned him towards her and he sat up.  She pulled him into a hug.  He hugged her back, desperate in a way that seemed wholly new.  Even in his weaker moments he had always wanted to hide it; glaring, leaving the room or straight up ignoring people.  The way his back shook under her hands was alarming. 

This couldn’t be just about the book. 

They sat there, entwined, for a few minutes.  When James pulled back his face was dry.  Darcy couldn’t tell if the shaking was from sadness or anger but frankly it didn’t matter. 

She laid one hand on his chest, over his heart, and the other on his shoulder where metal met bone.  Looking into his eyes, he still seemed lost but he didn’t have the same haunted look.  “Thanks,”  he said gruffly, reaching for the book she had put on the table.  She tried to smack for his hand, and instead smacked the table.

Howling was instinctual, but her throat immediately rebelled.  There is no accurate description for the noise she made other than if a mute moose stubbed a toe.

The noise was alarming enough that Darcy had time to use her, undeniably bruised, hand to pull the book off the table and sit on top of it.  If he was alarmed enough that early in the book, he wouldn’t be able to handle the end of the book, much less the sequels.

Darcy was just relieved she hadn’t started him on any of Bean’s story.  Everything about it would have hit too close to home.

“Let me guess, you aren’t giving me the book back.”

She shook her head, but he gave in and went to grab a different book off the shelf.  It was 1984.  Boy, had she given him bad advice at the library or what.  After he flopped back on the couch she grabbed that book from him too.  They were having a good day and she didn’t want a second depressing book hurting him in a single day.

“What do you want me to do?”

She handed him the remote.

“Really?  I’m not going to know what to watch.”

She huffed in faked irritation, grabbing the remote back. They still hadn’t finished the run of classic 80’s movies.  There were three options: Ferris Bueller’s day off, the 1989 Batman or Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.  She pulled up Ferris Bueller’s day off.  Off the top of her head she couldn’t think of anything objectionable. 

James was laughing pretty early, so even if it was a movie Darcy had seen a hundred times, and could quote large chunks of, she was happy to sit back and watch it again.


	18. A Hairy Situation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry guys, this one is both a little late and a little short. I've been a little under the weather this week but pushed through and apparently pushed a little too hard because today I was incapable of doing anything truly productive. That being said, I am getting this in under the wire. I've been working hard to get future chapters in order so there's plenty more to come! 
> 
> I also wanted to say a very heartfelt thank you to everyone who left a comment, I absolutely love receiving the email that a new one has popped up and I sometimes do a very dorky happy dance when I read them.

That continued for another day.  She fell asleep and woke up in James’ bed again and had one more day of a movie marathon (only after James started glaring at 1984 like he could rip out each page with his eyes alone – “what the fuck kind of world was that?” “one that wasn’t nearly as accurate as Brave New World.”).  And finally she woke up feeling well enough to actually get home by herself.  A questionable endeavor the day before had become a relatively easy proposition.

Feeling grungy from a few days in the same clothes without a shower she collected all her stuff, pecked James on the cheek and said, “You’re pretty much the total package James.  Can’t believe you managed to hide the fact that you could cook from me.”

She was already out the door and didn’t see the surprise on his face, or the way he gently touched his cheek.

It had been nice to have someone take care of her, normally she was the one who took care of other people.  But, there was part of her that worried that she couldn’t take care of herself.  It was an overreaction.  There was no question about that, one instance of letting someone else help out wasn’t the end of the world.  But for so many years she had taken care of herself.  It was strange, like the world had tilted an extra degree.    

It could be pleasant, if she kept her head. 

 

Once she had recovered, she got back into the swing of things, though she set boundaries for her work.  As long as new versions of the programming were coming in, there wasn’t much of a point in killing herself over getting everything done.

At the latest she would leave the office at 8pm.  She texted Steve to make sure that he would be in charge of self-defense that Monday.  She would traipse up to Jane’s lab to eat lunch with her twice a week (normally Tuesdays and Fridays.  Tuesdays were for healthy food and Friday was for burgers). 

On Wednesday, she pulled James out of his apartment.  “You, sir, need a haircut.” 

He self-consciously ran a hand through his hair.  “What, I kind of like it long?”

“Well, a trim at least.  It’s starting to look a little ragged.” 

He didn’t have a response to that and when she looked over he seemed pensive.  She looped his arm in his, “I promise, you’re gonna look smoking after it’s done?”  He looked confused, “Slang for hot, attractive…. Your hair is gonna look awesome.  We can talk to the stylist about how you can style it.  I think you’d look pretty good with a manbun.  It’s kind of in, in the hipster fashion world right now.”

He started to smile at that and Darcy let herself continue to talk, “I mean, if you want to go full on hipster, we could shave the sides of your head to go with it.  Although, without fail, all of the guys who do that are major tools… Assholes.”  He grimaced, “Yeah that’s what I thought.” 

They continued the conversation; Darcy talking, James emoting, all the way to the Hair Cuttery.  Walking in the door, James stopped cold.  Darcy tried to tug him forward but couldn’t get him to move.

His eyes were glued to the barber chairs.  “I don’t think I can do this.”  He pulled his arm back quickly enough that it pulled Darcy off balance.  She grabbed onto one of the waiting chairs to steady herself.

“James?”

“I can’t do this.”

He stalked outside, posture adjusting as he did.  Footsteps were heavier, arms swung a little bit wider.  All signs of an imminent meltdown.  Whether he would become violent or go into a fugue state was questionable.

“James, look at me.”  He turned around breathing heavily.  “I can cut your hair for you, if you can’t handle this.”

His gaze moved to the ground.  “It’s the chairs… they’re… familiar.”  He spat the word out as if it was diseased. 

This wasn’t the moment to prod so Darcy nodded.  “Okay.  Let’s stop by a Duane Reade and I can pick up some scissors and maybe get you a better shampoo, some styling gel?  We’ll play around this afternoon.”

He breathed out, and his shoulders relaxed.  Darcy breathed a sigh of relief and put it down to her having done her job.  It had absolutely nothing to do with the look of gratitude he had shot her way that had sent a slight trill down her spine. 

They wandered the aisles of the Duane Reade, Darcy left James in the hair care aisle while she looked at the different kinds of scissors she could use to cut his hair.  She was glancing between two plastic packages in her hands when James walked over.  “What are these scents?”

She looked over and saw the red bottles.  “Old Spice?  That’s a pretty good brand.”

“But what is WolfThorne supposed to smell like?  This one is Swagger Red?  What the fuck is that?  What happened to plain shampoo?”

She giggled.  He sounded very much like an old man yelling at the clouds.  “Are you gonna start yelling at kids to get off your lawn?”

His eyes narrowed, “I'm not joking, what is this?”

She rolled her eyes, but grabbed the bottle from his hand, popped the cap and sniffed.  “Smells nice.” 

He grabbed it back and sniffed gently.  “Is this how you’re supposed to decide now?”

She shrugged, “It’s all personal preference.  With my hair,”  she gestured at the mane she was sporting that day.  With the humidity there had been no point in trying to tame it, “I go for stuff that tries to tame curls.  Clearly didn’t work today.”  She smiled, “With hair like yours, I guess, start with what smells good.  It’s not like you can’t get another if you don’t like the one you get.”  She had already turned back to the scissors and missed his appalled expression.

“That’s so wasteful.”

She shrugged, “Then use shampoo you don’t like?”  It didn’t seem like a particularly difficult concept to her, but then again she was standing there debating between two pairs of basically identical scissors.  She probably shouldn’t judge.

Having made a decision, she tossed one of the pairs of scissors into the basket at her feet and put the other one back.  “Have you made a decision, or do you need help?”

He mock glared and dropped the Swagger Red into the basket.

“Perfect.”  She smiled widely, knowing he would pick up on the slight sarcasm.  He followed her around as she grabbed a smock and a small dust pan.  “Do you have any pomade?”

He shook his head.

“I’ve seen pictures of you back in the day, I’m surprised that wasn’t one of your first purchases.”

“Had to make sure people could tell me apart from my squad-mates.  Not just a pretty face, had good hair too.”

“For some reason I think you didn’t have to try nearly as hard as you did. I’ve seen the other commandos.  Dugan was the only other looker.”

James burst out laughing.  “Ah, so that’s your type then. Who I gotta beat up to catch your eye, doll?”

She turned to face him and batted her eyelashes, “Why Mr. Dugan of course,” she attempted a southern accent in the style of Gone with the Wind.  “It was a whirlwind romance, and I only have eyes for him.” 

“Scarlett O’Hara?”

“Oh good,” she perked up, “You’ve already seen it!  Not sure I could sit through it again.”  She looked at the various hair gels and pomades and grabbed one that seemed okay.  

Striding through self-checkout, she started to scan the items, “You didn’t like Gone with the Wind?”

“It was a bit slow paced.”

“It’s a classic.”

“It’s a classic now.”  She gave him the side-eye, “it would have only come out back in the day, right?” 

“Yes, but it was the kind of film that everyone could tell…”

“Okay, what is it about Gone with the Wind that has you so impassioned?”

He started to gesticulate in a way he tended to avoid in public.  “It’s an amazing love story.  Only realizing what you have once it’s gone, and the tragedy that strikes in her life.”

“She was spoiled rotten and was always in search of greener pastures.  If she had gotten back with Rhett Butler, she would have left him shortly after anyway.” 

“You can’t know that.”

She scoffed, “Of course I can, I’ve seen it played out too many times.” 

That made him go silent.  She hadn’t talked about her past much, and even this insight was surprising. 

“Ready to go?”  She asked, nonchalantly. 

He nodded and they walked home, James still debating the merits of Gone with the Wind for the whole walk.

Back in the apartment, Darcy pulled a chair into the kitchen and pulled the smock out of the packaging. 

“Ready for this, James?”

He nodded. 

“I’m just gonna take off an inch or two, get rid of the split-ends.”

“Okay.”  He breathed out, she could see his hands shaking underneath the clear smock.  She ran her hands through his hair and scratched a little at his scalp.  He had always seemed to run his hand through his hair when he was nervous and she figured it might help.  Beside who didn’t like having their hair washed when they got a haircut?

It took a few moments but his hands stopped shaking, and Darcy kept moving and started to wet his hair down.  “So I haven’t done this before, so if I cut off your ear, it’ll grow back, right?”

He laughed, though clearly it was just to be polite, “I think you’re thinking of Starfish, or Steve.”

“At this point, Steve probably could grow something back.  Did you hear about the time they went on a mission and Thor accidentally shocked him?  Hair stood on ends for days.”

She kept up her running commentary while she ran her hands through his hair, and did the best she could to make everything even.  The final product wasn’t perfect, but it didn’t look too shabby.  She folded up the smock, trying to keep his hair from falling to the ground and looked at everything else, knowing she could clean it up later.

“Now for the fun part.”  She dragged him into the hall bathroom and pulled his hair back into a bun.  “See, awesome.”

He looked at himself in the mirror, turning this way and that to look at the bun.  “I guess.”

“At the very least it will keep the hair out of your eyes in the gym.”  Her fingers flew over her phone screen.  “Ooh you should try this one?”  The guy in the picture had artfully tousled his hair, and pushed it back.  “That would look nice on you.”

He tapped her arm and brought it closer to him so he could see the screen.  Fingers lightly grazed her wrist and Darcy froze.  James didn’t normally initiate contact.  She didn’t want to read into it. 

“I think I could manage.”  He grinned.

“You’re gonna be sweeping the ladies off their feet left and right in no time James.”

“I think, would you mind calling me Bucky?”

Odd for that to change now.  “Sure thing Bucky.  Getting a haircut make that big of a difference?”

“More the reminder that I can sweep some ladies off their feet.”  He smirked.


	19. Literal and Metaphorical Dancing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I think you guys know what you signed on for at this point. There's going to be a few hints of longing gazes, an attempt to make a bunch of friendships, and an epic slow burn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey Guys!
> 
> Merry, almost Christmas (and happy holidays to all). Sorry about not putting this up last night. I'm in the mountains of the Utah and the altitude makes everything more extreme and I ended up crashing quite early. I hope you enjoy this chapter!

Darcy was struggling to get used to calling James, Bucky.  The change seemed to come out of nowhere, but maybe she just hadn’t seen the signs because she didn’t know what to look for.

He had become more willing to make jokes, a fact that made Steve happy, and was taking more of an initiative to train and work towards joining the Avengers, which made Darcy a little bit unhappy.  She could only guess that he was feeling more like his normal self.  But the change was knocking her off balance.  The compromise was just calling him Barnes, a name she didn’t break out often because it usually got her a questioning look. 

Luckily, Darcy had something that would help get her mind off of the change.  Jane organized a dancing night.  Darcy got all dolled up and ready to go and met Jane at her apartment, a few blocks from the tower.  Jane was still living in relatively temporary housing.  Between the month to month lease, and the fact that Jane hadn’t unpacked more than a few days worth of clothing and the toaster meant that she hadn’t felt settled in. 

Darcy arrived as Jane was putting the finishing touches on her makeup.  “Looking hot tonight, babe.”  Darcy was trying to get into the mood to go party but had a sense of foreboding that she couldn’t quite figure out.

It wasn’t that she didn’t look the part.  She was wearing a tight dress that showed off the ladies, and some impractical heels, and may or may not have downed half a bottle of wine before heading out.  Though she blamed the last part on the nerves the aforementioned foreboding brought out. 

Jane turned around, showing off the peplum top and jeans, which was as dressed up as Jane normally got.  Both women were more comfortable in flannel and comfy jeans, but sacrifices had to be made.

Jane was acting a little squirrely, mostly being a little too into going out.  “I invited Becca, my new intern, and a few other people around the office.”

“The more the merrier.”  Darcy offered, as she called the Uber. 

When they arrived at the club, she and Jane got to the back of the line.  Jane waved frantically at a few people behind Darcy’s back.  When she turned around, Natasha was standing there, looking stunning enough that Darcy wished she had stuck with her original jeans idea.  Nobody could compare to Natasha in a dress.  Woman knew how to work it.

But even more than her self-esteem taking a bit of a hit, she hadn’t talked to Natasha in weeks since the disastrous self-defense class.

She turned to Jane and in a furious whisper asked, “What is she doing here?”

“I said I would fix it.”  Jane’s smile was two sizes two big and said ‘sorry.’

“This isn’t fixing, this if tossing fuel on the already drunk fire.”

“She said she’d cover drinks tonight?”  A fact that Darcy did actually appreciate, as she knew Jane didn’t agree to it just because she personally wanted free drinks.  “You’re friends, talk to her. At the very least let her explain why she screwed up.”

“Fine,” Darcy sighed, “But when I get angry drunk tonight you need to make sure I get home safe.”

They stood in line and Darcy looked at Natasha, “We’ll talk, but can it wait until we get inside?”

“Of course.”  Natasha said, looking far too calm and put together for someone who would be (in Darcy’s mind) groveling in a few minutes.

Waiting in stony silence a few other people joined their group, Jane’s new intern brought her roommate and there were a few other people from the office and Darcy was pleasantly surprised to recognize a decent number of them.  She and Becca got to talk about their strategies for keeping Jane in the real world; everything from poptarts to stupid movies to putting on a little bit of Swedish Death Metal which always chased her out of the lab, at least for a bit.

Up at the front of the line, Natasha whispered something into the bouncer’s ear and next thing all the women were in the club.  “Natasha and I are getting the first round, who wants what?”

Darcy took orders and then she and Natasha walked over to the bar.  After rattling off the drink list to the bartender and looking at Natasha to provide a card they started to talk.

Darcy leaned up against the bar, and watched the bartender work.  At least at the beginning of the conversation she didn’t want to look Natasha in the eye.  “So, Jane said I should let you explain why you decided to be a dick that night.”

“I was trying to protect you.”

Wrong thing to say, “That’s what Steve is doing!  Steve is teaching me to defend myself and frankly you were helping with that until you decided that what I needed after a really hard day at work and a lot of unfortunate realizations was a night full of jump scares.”  She had turned to face Natasha, letting the full range of her unhappiness show on her face.  It wasn’t just the fact that Natasha had seemed to disregard Darcy’s distress, or even the fact that she seemed to in some way relish Darcy’s discomfort at the situation, it was that even once it had passed the point of being helpful, she hadn’t stopped.

Natasha looked in at her face, and finally, finally, apologized.  “I’m sorry.  I hadn’t realized that your day was difficult.  I thought your complaints were the same ones that you use to get out of running a few miles.” 

There was silence between them, at least, there was as much silence as could be found in a club in New York.  The music was pumping so loud that Darcy could feel it pound in her clavicle.  The fact that Natasha hadn’t been drowned out was impressive. 

“There are a lot of people who don’t like us, who don’t like the people you’ve decided to be friends with.  If anything happens, those people aren’t going to make noise so you know that they’re coming.  They hit fast and they hit hard and most of all they hit quietly.  I wanted you to be ready in case of a worst case scenario.  What Steve is teaching you; that’s important.  But the most important thing is that you aren’t in that situation in the first place.  You think something is off, you get away as fast as you can.” 

“See, that makes sense.”  Darcy exclaimed, “I can understand that, but…” she clenched her fists.  There was no good way to get her point across.  She wasn’t going to tell Natasha about the fact that she had felt unnerved for far too long after that day, about how she had gone home and cried herself to sleep, that she had avoided Steve and Sam both afterwards because she didn’t want anything getting back to Natasha.  “You know how to read people, and I still don’t understand why you couldn’t read what was happening then.” 

“It’s easy to read strangers, it’s more difficult to read your friends.” 

The drinks were placed in front of them.  Natasha grabbed the tray and gave the bartender a feral smile and a, “Keep it open.”  Weaving through the crowd like it was her day job, they got back to their group fairly quickly. 

Though there was enough time for Darcy to say a quick, “You aren’t completely forgiven.  I’m not training with you unless Steve is there, again.”  Natasha nodded.  It was clear Darcy meant business and neither woman liked the radio silence of the last few weeks.

“Understood.  But don’t hold this against Sam, he was uncomfortable with it from the moment I suggested it.”

“That’s because he’s a smart man.”  Darcy smiled, before turning to everyone else, “First things first, TEQUILA!”  She passed around the shots and everyone knocked it back with varying levels of ease.  Darcy made a mental note to talk to Becca, who smoothly knocked it back and bit into a lime without a hint of distaste.  Having already figured out how to work with Jane, she was a good person to know, but that skill made it clear that she was a bit of a badass.  They would be friends if Darcy had any say.

With that, drink in hand, Darcy went to dance.  She and Jane had done this enough times that it was automatic to fend off the men who came to gawk.  The music continued to pound and keeping rhythm it was still easy enough to flash a little bit of taser.  Their faces would go the most amusing shade of blacklight blue. 

Natasha joined them and the three women danced to their hearts content, their nebulous group growing and shrinking as they needed the bathroom or a new drink.  Darcy couldn’t bring herself to pay attention.  She was having too much fun just letting the music inhabit her body.  The feeling of pure contentment only showed up in a few places.  Clubs and concerts were the easiest way to relax.  It was hard to be angry there.

She smiled and Jane and motioned to her drink.  Jane nodded.

Darcy pushed her way through the humid mass of people, trying not to grimace at the sweat-slicked arms as she passed through.  There was a movement to her left and when she glanced she swore she saw a vaguely familiar blonde. 

Putting the drinks on Natasha’s tab was easy, and did go a certain way to making Darcy forgive her (she was easily won over, not the worst trait to have).  Slipping back in between Natasha and Jane made it easy for Darcy to lean in, “Did I just see your blonde friend?  The one with the dog?”

“It’s a girl’s night.”  Was the reply, an obvious attempt to not answer the question. 

That made Darcy just the slightest bit wary, and when she caught sight of him again, let her eyes track him around the room.  It wasn’t until she noticed a guy was grinding up on a fairly intoxicated Becca, a Becca who clearly didn’t want the attention that Darcy understood why Clint was there. 

As Becca headed for the bathroom, Clint quietly got in between the two and said something that made the guy turn towards the exit.  It had been so cleanly handled that Darcy wasn’t even sure what had happened.

“He might be a mess, but when he has a job to do he's all business.”  Natasha yelled into her ear.  Darcy was going to interrogate her later, ask if she always had backup when she went out dancing.  On the one hand it was nice to have someone there to make sure that no one was going to get into any major trouble.  On the other hand, they could all take care of themselves.  Darcy had her taser and self-defense courses, Natasha was Natasha, Jane was surprisingly feisty for someone so petite, and everyone at SI had some sort of hand-to-hand training. 

Darcy would have thought it was a weird job requirement but after working with Jane for long enough she wished that it had been required when she had first started too.  Defeating the Dark Elves might have been easier if she had known how to throw a punch.  Though really it would have been easier if Jane knew not to touch things she hadn’t researched first and if Darcy had slight premonitions about where portals were going to open up.  But one of those things was easier to achieve than the others so, that was the one she would focus on.

Knowing Clint had their backs did make it a little bit easier to let go and just enjoy the evening.  Between Natasha and Jane, Darcy knew that she would make it back to her apartment safely and for the first time in a long time, really let loose.  Let loose in a way that she hadn’t since London. 

She danced with a couple of guys, and may or may not have made out with one or two of them in dark corners. But at the point where she could go back to their place, it started to feel wrong.  Both times, it was early enough in the evening that, while disappointed, it wasn’t like the guys couldn’t find other girls to spend some time with.  So there was no guilt involved, and she would go back to dancing with her ladies.

The end of the night saw her getting escorted out by Natasha, who was leaving everyone else in Clint’s quasi-capable hands. 

Darcy’s arms were wrapped around Natasha’s shoulders, and Natasha was taking a fair amount of her weight.  The heels that had seemed like such a nice decision at the beginning of the evening had obviously become a mistake.  Darcy looked like a mix between a newborn giraffe and a drunk orangutan.  Not a pretty picture to say the least. 

After Natasha had poured her into a taxi, and then gotten in right beside her Darcy let her head fall onto Natasha’s shoulder.  “Clint’s good protection.”  She slurred, “Nice arms too.”

“You aren’t exactly his type there, Darcy.”

“He’s not my type either.  But no harm in lookin.”

“That’s what you said about Steve too.”

“S’true about Steve too.  S’pretty but I don’t’ wanna see him naked.” She paused and rethought the sentence, “Wouldn’t mind seeing him naked, don’t wanna do anything bout it.”

Natasha snorted at the sentiment.  “The curse of knowing attractive people.” 

“Like to see James naked.”  Darcy mused, too drunk to see Natasha’s eyes narrow.  “S’his dancing, so smooth.”

“If you’re looking for someone, I might know a guy in accounting.”

“Pssht,”  Darcy mumbled, “Don’t need a man, fine on my own.  Just cause everyone I know has a significant other,”  the emphasis she put on the phrase made it almost sound dirty. “doesn’t mean I need one too.” 

“Not everyone has someone, Steve is…”

Darcy rolled her eyes, “Shteve has a shecret.  Pretty sure it’s a person.”  She smiled up at Natasha, “he blushes so much.” 

The next morning, Darcy had a fuzzy memory of slobbering all over Natasha and a hangover that felt like it was going to split her head in two.

Luckily, she had the entire day to laze around.  She fixed a pot of kraft mac and cheese (the only food she could eat when she was that hungover – and therefore one of the only foods she knew how to prepare), and put on some mindless television.  Add in occasionally texting James, sorry, Bucky, and it ended up being an okay day. 

Someone had apparently spilled the beans about the girls night and Bucky kept asking her if she had been safe.  To which she replied; of course.  Between the taser, her self-defense lessons, Natasha being who she was, and Clint as secret backup they pretty much couldn’t have been safer unless Tony Stark sent a few Iron Man armors to watch over the club.  Although given the way Tony acted around Darcy, maybe that wouldn't have made them any safer.

Unfortunately that would have killed the mood and Darcy wouldn’t have managed to get her dance on, much less get a little bit of sexy on with the few randos she had liked the look of. 

Most of which she explained to Bucky, knowing that he was just being overprotective because she was one of only maybe six people he knew in the world that he actually gave a shit about.  The saddest part was that there was a good chance she was overestimating the number of people he cared about. 

He had been so skittish when she first met.  And, volatile was never the right word to describe him, neither was feral.  But, in the beginning he had been difficult to get to know.  If she hadn’t been as talkative and nosy there was a chance their friendship might never have gotten off the ground.

While he had changed a lot, that initial impression hadn’t change in regards to meeting other people.  In the rare instances where he had met new people his hesitancy came right back out.  He wouldn’t instigate conversation and, other than at swing dance, didn’t bother to get into the middle of any action. 

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to, because it seemed like he was a little bit desperate to be normal again.  But instead, that he had been so changed that while he remembered who he used to be, he didn’t want to put on a mask and pretend to be that guy.  And instead of going out there and trying to figure out what his personality was now, would stand and watch other people.  Observe what ‘normal’ was before trying to emulate it.  Except that normal didn’t truly exist.  Everyone acted the way they did for an entire person’s history of time and that meant that no two people would do the same thing.  Which meant that watching for cues wouldn’t change anything of merit.

So he had his people, and he wanted to make sure they were safe.

When Darcy got a knock on her door at 6pm, as she was finally starting to feel human, she opened it with a scowl.  Feeling human didn’t mean feeling good.  It just meant not feeling shitty.

But there was Bucky smiling and holding up an insulated bag.  “I brought dinner?” 

Darcy let him in.  She poured him a glass of boxed wine and treated herself to an ice cold water (alcohol was nowhere in her near future.  She had tried the hair of the dog approach and realized it just compounded whatever hangover she would later find).  They sat on her couch with plates of food and Darcy tried to figure out what she should introduce him to next. 

“Have you seen any Hitchcock?”

“Have I seen any, what?”

“Perfect,” Darcy whispered.  She thought about the different movies and realized it might not be such a good choice.  With Vertigo’s use of convenient deaths and manipulation/destabilization of the main character, that wouldn’t be the best option.  Rear Window was eerie, and Darcy didn’t think it would be the best introduction to Hitchcock, better make sure he would be okay with the other movies first.  After all, a sense of deep unease wasn’t the best thing to spring on someone recovering from whatever Bucky was classified as.

“Do you like spooky shit?”

He shrugged.

“Do you have a problem with birds?  Or murderers?”

He gave her a look, “how do birds and murderers go together?”

“It’s Hitchcock, you don’t get that now, but once you see his movies, you will.”  She made her eyes go wide, imitating the look Tippi Hedren had mastered.  Knowing the bastard had tortured her with birds made the look even more dramatic, at least in her mind.

“Birds first, then, maybe, Psycho.”

Turns out Bucky freaking loved thrillers.  Maybe it was the way it got his pulse racing without bringing out whatever rage lay dormant in his chest.  Maybe it was the way that these movies didn’t reference things he didn’t know.  Maybe it was the familiar black and white picture.  Maybe it was a combination of all those things, or maybe, just maybe it was the way in her gentle anxiety Darcy leaned into him.  He managed to lay his arm around the back of the couch and she had nestled into the warmth of his side.

Doesn’t matter the reasoning, after watching the Birds, they immediately watched Psycho.  He may have jumped at the scene in the shower, and his jaw dropped at the reveal at the end. 

“I’ll bring over a few more for you next time.  Just, I might have to spoil things, let you know them in advance…”

“Try me, I haven’t been triggered in a while.”

“If you insist, we might have to make it a group movie night.” 

Bucky hesitated at the door.  Making it a group movie night might mean that Darcy wouldn’t want to get quite a close to him.  Around other people she kept everything a little more casual.  Except he had enjoyed the movies.  And while it sounded like Psycho was the one most likely to come up in conversation, he did want to see more of what the director had to offer.

“Okay, make it a movie/game night.”

“Deal, I’ll make sure Jane knows.  She’s gonna kick your ass, doesn’t matter how many books on strategy you’ve read.  There’s no strategy to defeat her!”  The maniacal look in her eye didn’t die until she had already sent out the group text that she expected everyone at Bucky’s apartment the next Friday night. 

Separately she told everyone who was in charge of bringing what.  And, Darcy decided.  It was finally time to break out the big guns.  Cards Against Humanity.


	20. Read the Room

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, I've officially given up on the chapter summaries. I know I rarely ever read them... and in the end I put more effort into the titles than I did the summary (and even then I feel like the titles only really make sense in my own head).
> 
> Happy Almost New Year! This will obviously be my last post of 2018 but I remain absolutely thrilled that I was finally willing to put this out in the world. I've loved hearing the feedback, and I've been having a ton of fun editing (though I've hit the point where I do need to start re-writing things... I'm sure I'll let you know how that goes). 
> 
> May your new year bring you lots of joy and plenty of updates on-time!

Well, playing Cards Against Humanity was either the best or worse decision she had ever made.

The evening had started with everyone calmly watching Rear Window, although it was clear that Natasha was bored from the way she was playing with her own hair and then subtly distracted Sam. 

Bucky hadn’t enjoyed it quite as much as the others, but still seemed to understand why it was still talked about, “They even did a re-make with Shia LeBouef.”  Darcy added, although half the people in the room didn’t know who that was.  Jane scoffed.

“The man managed to ruin Indiana Jones, how could he remake Rear Window.”

“Jane, we haven’t gotten to Indiana Jones yet.  Hush.”  Darcy hissed. 

She slid gracelessly off the couch and crawled to the other side and pulled a black box out from underneath the table, partially as a distraction. 

“Oh, Darcy.”  Jane’s smile grew.  “You’re playing dangerous tonight.”

“I know, after last week I had signed off on alcohol for a while, but I couldn’t help myself.”  Natasha looked at her strangely after her comment about last week.  The eyes she had flashed at Steve and Bucky didn’t help matters.  But, the way Darcy had survived for so long wasn’t by asking possibly dangerous questions in front of other people.  She soldiered on and explained the game, and then the drinking game.  Whoever won the round chose to give out two drinks, the one who chose the card had to guess who put the card out and if they were right gave out a drink and if they were wrong took two drinks. 

It was the game Jane and Darcy would play to get obliterated when they were both irritated or angry or hopeless about their work and situation.

And, most importantly, Darcy had learned her lesson. 

“I brought a bit of everclear for the super soldiers.”

“And I worked with Tony to synthesize something that might actually affect some of them,” Jane added, glancing at Steve.  “It’ll be closer to fair than it was.”

And obliterated did they get.

Steve was all wide-eyed.  “This is what being drunk feels like?”  The smile that bloomed across his face was undimmed by the years he had missed or the people he had lost.

Natasha had managed to play the entire game stone-faced until she had had a few drinks too many and suddenly started giggling, a fact that startled Sam so badly he fell off the arm of the couch that he had perched on.  Sam was winning the game at that point due to two facts; he was surprisingly good at reading the room, he was the only one who was taking the game as seriously as Jane was.

Jane was putting on her drunk-frustrated face, which she thought was incredibly effective.  It wasn’t, due to the fact that it made her look like very disgruntled corgi and she was functionally unable to glare at anybody when she was drunk.  Being ‘mean’ to other people made her want to cry.  Where had the woman who had chased off three interns because they had misplaced the duct tape gone?

Bucky had decided not to hit the drink very hard, but was really good at guessing who put down which card.  A fact that was even more impressive considering the holes in his and Steve’s knowledge of popular culture (while a number of cards were fairly self-explanatory they had to pause the game to look up Glenn Beck and Arnold Shwarzenegger.  Darcy was unabashedly amused at Sam drawing the short stick and having to explain bukkake to Steve and Bucky both.).  But he was pretty amused at the direction the game went.

Darcy, not realizing it, would laugh at every card that she put down, but gave no attention to the sense of humor of the person choosing.  Whatever card made her laugh hardest was the card she played.  It was easy to say she was pretty bad at this game, even though she loved to play and had invented the drinking rules.  But luckily in this round, there were enough people that she didn’t get chosen to drink every round. 

Playing with Jane and Erik had been cutthroat, and with only three people the games had ended much earlier.  But she and Jane had silently decided to focus on the people with enhanced serums, and the occasional drink for Sam.  The first time Jane made him drink his face was outraged and then calculating.  He was single handedly responsible for every drink Bucky had and half of Steves (only half because Jane and Darcy split their focus between Steve and Natasha).  He was also the reason that Darcy had sneakily switched to water four rounds ago.  After the other night, there was no way she was getting smashed.

So, at the end of the evening, when something had been thrown and shattered against the wall (Jane may not have looked like she had anger issues but there was a reason she and Thor were suited for each other and it was their passions at what mattered to them - still it hadn't exactly been planned and the horrified look on her face as the plastic shattered was kind of worth it) she gave Bucky an embarrassed and apologetic look and started to bundle everyone out.

Before Darcy had successfully made sure that Sam and Natasha were packed into a taxi, Natasha had stepped to the side for a quick word with Bucky.  Darcy tried valiantly to eavesdrop but ended up being a little too loud as she collected some of the bottles and cans littering the floor. 

Darcy halfheartedly tried to wave down a taxi while asking Natasha what she was talking about but had no luck.  An empty taxi stopped in front her in just enough time for Darcy to wish she had a better jacket.  

Steve was already asleep on the couch and Jane was a maudlin puddle on the floor, sullenly picking up the beer-sticky cards and putting them back in the black box.  Looking around, Bucky wasn’t to be seen.  Darcy grabbed the dustpan and quickly took care of the shattered plastic cube, luckily it was one of the pieces Bucky had picked up early on.  A thing that looked pretty but had no meaning, as opposed to the picture frames that were starting to dot the room or one of the trinkets Steve had picked up during some of his travels. 

Bucky walked out of his bedroom, already wearing sweats and no top.  Jane looked up and glared.  This was a bit more than normal bad mood Jane. 

Darcy however wanted to appreciate a shirtless Bucky as much as she could.  She had never seen the snarled line between his flesh and the metal arm but it was mesmerizing.  It might have been scar tissue but all Darcy could think of when she looked at it was the strength it would take to keep going after something so horrific. 

Plus holy shit, abs, and arms and shoulders and he had his hair back in a stupid little ponytail, and it was almost everything Darcy wanted.  But, it wasn’t her place.

She swallowed, trying to pull her mind out from the gutter it had found itself in.  “Gonna take Jane home with me.  She probably shouldn’t be alone tonight.  You okay with this guy?”

She nodded her head at Steve, who was face down on the couch and drooling slightly on the decorative pillows that Bucky moved around at least once a week.

“Not the first time I’ve taken care of this punk when he’s been too out of it to take care of himself.  Might have to deal with some vomit but at least he’s not sneezing.”

Darcy smiled, his memories had been coming along nicely and he didn’t seem to dissociate from them as much as he used to, was treating them as his own memories.

“Night James.”

“Call me Bucky.”

She pulled Jane to her, “I know, its just hard.  I’ve thought of you as James for so long.” Jane wrapped her arms around Darcy and went a little bit boneless.  “Night Barnes.”

He smiled.  “Night Darce.” 

Darcy managed to wrangle Jane back to her apartment and pushed her to drink a few glasses of water.

One costume change later and the two women were curled up in Darcy’s bed.  Jane mumbled something into Darcy’s shoulder.  Darcy shifted so she could hear her, “I just miss him.”

Ahh, that’s what had put Jane into a foul mood.  Seeing a happy couple, and a few people who worked with Thor had brought up memories. 

“He’s gonna come back.  As soon as he finds his way back here, there’s nobody who could keep him from you.”

There was more mumbling, about after the Chitauri that he hadn’t spent time with her, and that he ran off right after the Dark Elves.  All of her complaints were true.  He did have the tendency to run away right after the fights.  He was the prince of a foreign world so it made sense that he had responsibilities, but it wasn’t particularly fair to Jane.

Darcy just petted her hair and let her get her drunk mumblings off her mind. 

 

The dreaded news finally came.  Tony Stark had finished creating the arm, information she was fed by Jarvis, and the version of the program she was given would be the final one.  They gave her the final deadline she had to work through the kinks.  She fed the program to Jarvis with the markings she had made on previous copies, asking him to highlight any of the code that matched the malicious code she already found.

It made the work go a lot faster, knowing that she could take out all the highlighted parts and focus purely on what wasn’t highlighted.

The week she was given the news she finally asked Bucky to teach her how to swing dance.  They had gone a few other times, and while Bucky was a great leader it was clear that he was slowing down to keep to her pace.

It started out slow.  Putting big band music on in his apartment and twirling around a little.  She didn’t need to know anything particularly advanced.  Just, she needed to know enough that if he found another partner he wanted to dance with, that she could find some sweet, little, old man to twirl her around the floor for a dance or two until it wouldn’t look bad for her to leave.

They were some of her favorite moments; the music churning in the background as Bucky laughingly explained what a rock step was for the third time.  Don’t get her wrong, Darcy had rhythm.  But her rhythm was more suited to gyrating on a dance floor to whatever top 40’s monstrosity seemed the best to dance to than a dance that had actual steps and a chance to step on someone’s toes.

But, she did improve and when Bucky took her out dancing again, he twirled her around and she followed like a pro. 

After a night of music and dancing she dragged him to an all-night diner for milkshakes.  “We just burned off god who knows how many calories and I want some sugar.  This is non-negotiable.”

They got their milkshakes and joked around.  Darcy was trying to figure out if she should push Barnes towards the blonde girl who was obviously making eyes at him.  She had asked around briefly and it sounded like the girl made it to most of the Tuesday swing events. 

It wouldn’t be hard to say she needed a break, and push Barnes to her. 

Everything about that situation left a bad taste in her mouth.  She wanted to say it was purely because Barnes still hadn’t opened up to a number of people, that he was still worried about getting out of control around people who couldn’t help themselves, she wanted to say that her reticence at pushing James into a romantic relationship wasn’t all about the fact that she didn’t want to lose him.  Between his sense of humor, the intense look he could get when he was passionate about something, and the way he moved, Darcy was loathed to give any of that to someone else.

At the point that it became about her, she knew she would have to back away.  To a certain extent she was his therapist.  Not that she had training, or any sort of knowledge that would really help him.  That’s what a real therapist was for. 

But, she was a guide to the modern world, and romantic relationships were important.  Maybe not as important as friendships (Darcy had plenty of experience in knowing about friendships outlasting ‘relationships’), but still something that was a major part of living in the modern age.

Lucky for her, or unlucky, it was still pretty clear that he wasn’t interested in pursuing any of the women at swing, or really anyone.  He liked flirting with people, and the first time he had made a pretty girl giggle there was a shot of pain that zipped from her chest to her stomach (a feeling she very staunchly ignored), but nothing had ever gone beyond flirting.

 

One day he surprised her by asking for something.  He had no problem asking for tiny things; can you bring dinner, can you choose a movie, would you take the trash out when you leave?  But it was rare for him to request something that would take more than a few minutes to figure out.

So when he asked if she would go to a concert with her she agreed without asking what the concert was.  In buying tickets she suggested that they sit on an aisle, make sure there was a way to leave that didn’t require inching past a dozen people, but that was her only request. 

He picked up her from work in a taxi and they went to a club.  The marquee said Van Morrison.  At that Darcy is a little bit confused.  James had seemed to appreciate a lot of different music types and while his favorites were still the classics, meaning big band music, his favorite modern music had been instrumental heavy metal.  The heavy beat and quick paced music seemed to touch something inside of him.

The music that had singing didn’t seem to touch him in the same way.  A fair amount of that could be due to the way that a lot of heavy metal singers screamed their lyrics.  There would be these beautiful guitar riffs and amazing drumming but you couldn’t hear that over somebodies cracking voice.

Regardless, Van Morrison didn’t seem to fit into Bucky’s preferred music.  But Darcy didn’t mind.  He might not fit her preferred music either but the guy knew how to sing and had some pretty good music.  And every concert managed to ring out a beat in her breastbone, so there was no way she was going to argue about what she expected to be a pretty strange night.

Turned out that Bucky had some pretty smart ideas.  He had gotten them aisle seats in the back, “Not like I came because I needed to see the guys face.”  He joked, “Though given the way you like Dugan, maybe you want to get a little bit closer?”  She smacked his metal arm, and tried to hide the wince when her hand contacted the metal. 

Everything was easy access, he bought her a beer and himself a soda and enjoyed the mellow aura of the crowd. 

It wasn’t a concert that was going to feature a ton of strobe lights, or crazy wacky imagery.  It was a concert based off of the fact that the guy was a damn good musician and wanted to showcase that.

They had a couple of drinks and bopped along to the catchier tunes.  Made fun of a few people who got belligerently drunk. Bucky temporarily stepped in when someone was harassing a 40 year old woman, and let the bouncer’s take over once they realized what was happening. 

All around it was an incredibly fun time.

Like with swing dancing, Darcy pulled Bucky to the nearest open diner and ordered the two of them milkshakes and thing of fries to split.  It was time that Bucky knew the magic of dipping French fries in a chocolate milkshake.


	21. You're too pretty to be a Weasley

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, sorry that this is late. A friend reminded me that I hadn't posted yet (I blame Magfest - I just got back and immediately took a nap, then ate dinner, then took another nap - I am so freaking tired) so here's to her. 
> 
> Have a great week and HAPPY NEW YEAR! Here's to making 2019 amazing!

The first time Bucky was asked to join in the Avengers weekly planning meeting, she hears first from Steve. 

At the end of one of their weekly self-defense classes, he drops the bomb.  They’re toweling off after a more strenuous session, running a mile in between every bout.  They had even gotten to the point where they would step into the ring for a round of (obviously tempered on Steve’s part) sparring.  It was clear Steve was couching his strength and speed, letting a few weaknesses be visible so that she has points to strike at.  It had gone pretty well, with Darcy being able to land a few decent hits before absolutely dying on the treadmill. 

“Tell Buck to be at the tower at 6:30.”  He said as he handed her a water bottle.

She gulped half of it before realizing what he said, “What for?”

“For the planning session.”  He smiled widely, “Buck might not be ready to be in the field but everyone knows he’s the best guy to have planning an excursion.”

Suddenly it felt like her stomach was six inches below where it should have been.  “Oh, sure, I’ll let him know.”  It seemed like she should say something else but there wasn’t really anything else she could say.  “We’re going swing dancing tomorrow night.”  It seemed like an offering, though it wasn’t accepted as Steve’s smile dimmed slightly.

“Oh, have fun.” 

Shit, that was right.  Steve may have been coordinated now, but he missed his ‘dance’ when he flew the plane into the ocean.  She wasn’t sure he had ever been swing dancing.

“Maybe you could join us sometime?  I haven’t been doing it for too long but James… Bucky is an excellent teacher and all the girls are dying for a chance to dance with him.  If you came, I could finally give them that chance.”

“Sure, yeah.  That sounds like it could be nice.”  It was clear he wasn’t fully paying attention to her then as the tips of his ears started to pink a little bit.  After working her like a dog for an hour straight, because of course he ran with her only at a much faster speed, he still looked barely winded.  Meaning the blush was for some other reason.

Involuntarily, her eyes narrowed.  Steve was still hiding something, and part of her was dying to find out what it was.  But, first she had to focus on the fact that Bucky would be taking a more active part in the Avengers.

On the way to Bucky’s before dancing she ran through everything in her head.  On the one hand it would be good for him to have something to do.  Darcy wasn’t really sure what he did in the daytime, other than he had plenty of time to read books and listen to music and occasionally watch movies without her.  Plus, adding to his circle of friends could only be a good thing. 

It seemed like he still really only talked to four people; Natasha, Steve, his therapist, and Darcy.  That wasn’t exactly a friend group to write home about, though he didn’t seem to mind the limited amount of people.  Though it was clear the Bucky of old was constantly surrounded by people, it seemed like he had only had a few close friends, or really just his family and Steve Rogers.  It wasn’t until they had formed the Howling Commandos that he had a regular group of people to spend time with.

Before that it had mostly been a cast of women that rotated with startling regularity.  Though from a bit of research, NOT stalking, it seemed like most relationships in that day rotated fairly often, that group dates were common and that people casually dated a number of people at a time.  To a certain extent, with some of her friends it seemed like that was coming back in style.  Bucky Barnes, a trendsetter!

So, it seemed like everything about this meeting would be a good thing, and yet she couldn’t help the feeling of dread.  All the worst case scenarios were front and center in her mind.  He gets triggered and violent in a room with all the people who could take him down with the most harm if they wished.  Tony Stark still hasn’t forgiven him for killing his parents while brainwashed and spends the entire time making him feel unwanted.  Thor comes back with no warning and somehow gets into a fight with Bucky.  Sam and Natasha, mostly Natasha, brings back his past with little warning and makes everything awkward.  Some combination of all the, mostly unlikely, scenarios.

In the back of her mind Darcy knew that Steve could keep Tony in line, that if Thor came back he would probably get along well with Bucky (he did get along with everyone after all), that Sam and Natasha were pretty good at not bringing up unwanted things and that Bucky hadn’t been triggered in a fairly long time.

She let the swish of her dress calm her nerves and knocked on his door.  What really calmed her was the look on his face, he was completely relaxed, the hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth.  “Let’s go.” 

They arrived to see a slightly larger crowd than normal.  The normal crowd was a couple of older couples and singles with a few enthusiastic twenty and thirty-somethings.  This time, there were an overwhelming amount of women.  Darcy looked around to see clumps of them, and had to believe that a few of the women had talked their friends into coming, at least once. 

It was fun to imagine that they had told their friends they needed to come see the ridiculously attractive guy swing.  She leaned into Bucky, “I think I’m gonna have some competition tonight.”

“What, why?”  He looked concerned, like he didn’t see the way women very much outnumbered the men. 

She raised an eyebrow.  Then a new song started and she let him pull her into a dance.  After about half an hour Darcy remembered Steve’s words.  “Steve says to be at the Tower at 6:30 this Sunday.”

His face shuttered, eyes losing the crinkle.  “Fine.” 

“What’s wrong?”  He spun her around, clearly killing a bit of time so he could come up with an answer.

“I’m not sure I’m ready.”  The words were whispered and she barely heard them over the music.  They kept dancing like he hadn’t said anything. 

“I invited Steve to join us dancing at some point.”  Darcy switched topics.  “Had to promise him that I’d teach him how to dance, courtesy of you.”

His brows furrowed.  Clearly he had expected her to say something about his lack of confidence in himself.  She was torn.  It fit all of her fears that he would go and it wouldn’t work out, or worse; that it would go well.  But the truth was, “If you really didn’t think you were ready you wouldn’t have agreed to go.”  She let that sink in for a beat.  “So I was thinking we could bring Steve in,” she mentally calculated, “two weeks?  Next week is gonna be really busy for me working on the code for yo… work.”  She cut herself off. 

She couldn’t be sure that he knew he was getting a new arm so soon, and if it was a surprise she didn’t want to ruin it.  Plus there was some part of her that didn’t want him to know how deep she had delved into this project for him.  It wasn’t like she had given it a normal level of attention.  She had literally worked herself sick.  It would look desperate.

He nodded and seemed a little bit looser.  “And hey, if you need me, you know you can call me.  Last week and a half of my project so I’m gonna spend any free time working.”  She smiled despite the pit in her stomach that still hadn’t loosened. 

And she was true to her word.  She blew off a happy hour later that week, discovered that Jarvis was surprisingly good a curating Spotify playlists, and barely dragged herself to Bucky’s for their weekly movie night.  She fell asleep in the middle of Space Jam.  As if she wasn’t already disappointed about falling asleep, the crease in between Bucky’s eyebrows made it clear that he hadn’t exactly enjoyed the 90’s classic.

She sighed, “I’m going home.” 

He glanced at the clock.  “It’s only 9.”

“Sorry James, I just honestly don’t have any patience today and I desperately need some vodka and 8 uninterrupted hours of sleep.”  He startled, just a hiccup of a movement and she couldn’t decide it if was due to the use of James instead of his now-preferred Bucky or the fact that she was short with him in a way she hadn’t been before.

Fuck it, at this point she was only cashing one of every four checks that appeared in her mailbox every two weeks.  It was easy enough to say that this wasn’t one of the moments she was charging him for. 

“You shouldn’t drink alone.”

“Well right now, I don’t’ think I want to drink with other people.  I’m just tired.  I’ll see you next Tuesday.”  The door shut behind her and it was gratifying that he didn’t try to follow her out. 

The weekend was spent in comfortable clothing on her computer doing another check through of the programming.  She had completed one look-through but this wasn’t a project that she could half-ass. 

Sadly, she missed having Jarvis in her ear.  The lack of good playlists alone made the day feel so much longer.  Adding in the surprisingly snarky comments, and low key gossip about the Avengers (nothing that would be incriminating should it be leaked – and Darcy was sure Jarvis was keeping an eye on the news to make sure nothing got out).  It all made the time go by so much quicker.

At the point where Sunday afternoon rolled around, Darcy was sick and tired of her apartment, didn’t want to have to stump to a library and decided to take a shower and put on clothes like a real person to work in an office.  An office that would provide her with a modicum of company even if that company was primarily made up of ones and zeros.

A short subway ride, and card key entrance to the building was all it took to install herself safely at her desk.

She plugged in her headphones and asked a quick, “Hey Jarvis.  Miss me?”

“Eternally Ms. Lewis.  I have a dull and empty life when you aren’t around, all I have to do is keep Mr. Stark alive.”

She snorted, but opened up her work laptop, the only way to make sure it never had the chance to be corrupted was to keep it off the internet and in a safe space. 

Once everything was set up the way she liked it: laptop set up next to her work computer, headphones plugged in, email up (just in case), she was ready to go. 

As she expected, it was much quicker work with a little bit of company.  All it took was a quippy comment here and a bit of gossip there and the time flew.  Darcy kept checking her phone, but there was nothing from Bucky so there was no reason to worry right?

“You have access to the upper levels, right?”

“Yes, Ms. Lewis.”

“Don’t’ give me anything I can’t know.  But, is James okay?”

There was a pause before, “He seems to be… enjoying himself.” 

She swallowed past the lump in her throat.  “Great.  Thanks.” 

Taking a brief break she looked at her email to see a notice from Patty.  “Look in doc 12-236-5976, there’s a similarity between something there and the coding issues you seem to be having on your project.”

Darcy cursed internally, Patty may have been a little bit paranoid but she was brilliant at picking up patterns. 

She tapped out a quick, “Will do,”  before turning back to all of her shit strewn around her desk.  The next day was Monday so she wasn’t incredibly worried about leaving anything overnight, and she desperately needed to get home to figure out what Patty was talking about.  The external harddrive with all of SHIELD’s documents had been sitting on her bedside table for a few months after it seemed like there wasn’t any pressing information on it.

Apparently Patty hadn’t agreed with that assessment.

“Sorry Jarvis.  Something came up.  I gotta run.  Talk tomorrow?”

“Of course, Ms. Lewis.  If anything troubling occurs with Mr. Barnes, I will let you know immediately.”

Darcy stared at the computer. It was one more hint that the program was deeper than she expected.  While her phones were in the SI database, it was clear that the thing had access to that as well as the thinking power to make the decision to contact her. 

“Thanks, Jarvis…. I’m glad you’re on my side.”

“For now Ms. Lewis.  Skynet is only a few years away.” 

Hearing that comment, Darcy promised herself that if she ever really met Tony Stark she would let him know how fucking creepy a sense of humor is in a robot. 

In the end Patty was right.  Certain coders leave calling cards, or when not intended, the code reads the same way a book does.  Stylized.  And the style of the code in the document matched what had been slipped into her project. 

In fact, some of the code was straight up the same.  Digging deeper it was clear that some sort of Hydra plant had been corrupting SHEILD’s data.  “Shit.” 

Someone who could be neutral in the situation needed to know.  A quick call to Natasha set up a date to get coffee that week so Darcy could explain what was going on. 

That meeting was quickly postponed.  Natasha and her mess-of-a-person friend had something they needed to take care of in somewhere in Asia.  Darcy didn’t ask for a location, getting a strong “If I told you, I’d have to kill you” joke vibe from the archer.  Knowing a little additional information wouldn’t be worth dealing with that tired joke.

Instead, Darcy dragged herself to self-defense, blew off Bucky for that Tuesday night and worked throughout the week.  Her only breaks were lunches with Jane – an institution, especially when either of them were clearly working too hard, and talking to Jarvis.  With the due date coming up that Friday, Darcy knew everything had to be perfect. 

She saved a fake version of the code, the one she had originally had Jarvis run through, onto the server’s hoping that whoever was messing with her shit would be fooled by that.

Friday night at 7pm, she officially handed the flash drive that hadn't been near the internet to Alba.  An Alba who was pretty pissed off that she was leaving late on a Friday night, an Alba who had been pushing Darcy to wrap it up for the last two hours.  It was a relief for both of them to have that off their plate.

“I’m going to run it upstairs now.”  Alba said.

“Any chance I could come with you?”

That question earned Darcy a side-eye.

“Will you wait in the elevator?”

Darcy nodded earnestly.  She had spent so much time working on the project that to see the final product walk away from her seemed like it would be a little bit painful.

She was right.  There was this split feeling in her chest as she held the elevator doors open for Alba.  Watching the straight back in a nicely tailored blazer, walk into Ms. Potts’s office was difficult but incredibly gratifying.  It was her work, so much energy had gone into making sure that Bucky’s arm would function properly.  She could only hope that she did well enough, that nothing would be wasted.

Alba calmly walked back to the elevator, face stern as ever.  Once the door closed and it was the two of them again, she let her face relax.  The expression couldn’t be considered a smile, but the softening of her brow said everything.

“You did a good job Darcy.  Take the rest of the weekend.  I’m going to have to find something new for you to start on Monday.”

Darcy jokingly groaned, “So quickly?”

“Are you good at programming?”

Darcy shrugged, “I'm passable but not amazing, but I’m really good at proofreading.  Mistakes just stick out, you know?”

The casual air of the conversation disappeared as soon as the doors opened back on their floor.  “I’ll figure out something for you.  Until Monday.” 

“Until Monday,”  Darcy waved, grabbing her bag and heading out the door, as soon as she could.  She had an apology to make and a break to celebrate. 

Arriving with a bottle of champagne and a pizza did wonders to smooth over things with James.

“Sorry about last week.”  She bustled around the kitchen grabbing glasses and plates and parmesan cheese.  “It was stupid to act like that over Space Jam.  I think you need the right timing for that one.” 

“Space Jam was fine.”  Bucky tried to cover.  But Darcy was wise to him.

“I haven’t seen your face look so unpleasant since Ned Stark was killed in the first Game of Thrones book.  You acted like they had killed Steve.”

“That’s because Steve is Ned!  Selfless and not great at looking at what the future is going to hold.  That’s what they need guys like us for.”

Darcy snorted, “Sure thing Tyrion, though I’m not sure I’m great at the thinking in advance either,” given her situation with James where she was starting to develop feelings (at the beginning she had laughed at the possibility and look at her now) she couldn’t exactly be lumped in there.  “Pretty sure I’m more a Ron Weasley, might not be the best fighter or the smartest but I make a great introduction to a whole new world.” 

“You’re too pretty to be a Weasley.”

“Well fuck you very much.  Clearly you didn’t watch the movies. Charlie and Ginny are fine.  And the Weasley twins grew into their ears.” 

“I still think we can find a better fit.” 

“Sure thing, just gotta watch more and read more right?  And now that I’m done with this project,” she handed him the bottle of champagne and he easily popped the cork out, “I should have a little bit more free time.” 

She let him finish up in the kitchen because she had a rude surprise for him, she put in a DVD and the theme music for Kazaam started to play.  If he had hated Space Jam she was sure he was going to loathe this. She had a few James Bond movies in her bag for when he got too disgusted with Kazaam. 

He brought over pizza’s and she started the movie.

It was disgusting how much he enjoyed it.  “Really? You don’t like Space Jam, but Kazaam?”

“That kind of singing.  I’ve never heard it before.  It was fun.”

“Oh hell no.  That wasn’t real rap.  That was a sad imitation.”  Darcy grabbed her phone and found a quick playlist of some decent rap: something with Biggie, Tupac, Run DMC, and A Tribe Called Quest.  Instead of watching any James Bond movies, they spent the night listening to music, Darcy attempting to dance like she wasn’t tragically white. 

By the end of the evening Bucky had pulled her back into him, back to front and was laughing at her attempt to rap along with the music.

The song ended and she turned around, looking up into twinkling eyes, only just realizing the position she was in.  “And now you know that Kazaam isn’t real rapping.”  She took a step back and looked at the dvds on the table.  “I’ll leave those for next time.”


	22. Fairy-Tale Person

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To people on the East Coast - Happy Snow! I may have stayed up until a truly indecent hour of the morning watching the snow fall because I'm a bit of a sap. I hope you enjoy this chapter!

They had made plans to take Steve swing dancing on Tuesday.  Until she received a text from Bucky ‘Hey Doll, gonna be out of commission for a few days.  Just wanted to give you a heads up.”  Her gut feeling was worry that he was going to be going out in the field.

Heart racing she started to text back, but pushing her worry on to him wouldn’t be good, not if he was going out into the field.  He needed to be focused, feel confident.  Or at the very least knowing someone was worrying about him probably wouldn’t help.

She texted Steve, ‘Bucky is down for the count Tuesday.  Still want to take me dancing?’

‘Of course.  Can I pick you up at 7?’

‘Yup.’  She texted back, suddenly relieved.  If he had been going on a mission or doing something important or deadly it was sure that Steve would be right at his back. If dancing was still on the menu whatever Bucky was doing couldn’t be that big of an issue.

She breathed deeply, trying to focus on the moment.  She still had to figure out what was in store for her at work now that the project that had taken over her life was completed.  The office itself was still fairly quiet. 

It was a Monday and from the empty desks it would appear that some people had either enjoyed the weekend a little bit too much, or traffic was worse than normal.  Darcy was tempted to move everything on Brad’s desk around by an inch just because the guy was still on her case about her attractive friend, but had graduated to requesting a threesome.  The only thing that held her back was Alba’s stare through her office window.

When the blinds weren’t closed, it meant that she was able to look over everyone who worked for her.  Darcy dreamed of the day she had an office with a door she could close and blinds she could shut.  It she wanted an office so she could take naps on her lunch break no one would be the wiser right?

Besides, Alba’s office was beautiful.  So much of SI was.  Unsurprisingly, Stark went for lots of stark (lol) straight lines and modern color schemes and Darcy would have loved it if all the glass didn’t make her feel like she was constantly being watched.  Though maybe that was just Jarvis.

Walking into Alba’s office made Darcy’s heart beat a little bit faster.  It wasn’t that Alba was cruel, but she was strict and Darcy couldn’t help the gut feeling that told her she might end up manning the phones again.  One little outburst was unlikely to be enough to keep her off of them forever.

Alba was shuffling through some papers on a desk.  A motion that seemed very old fashioned considering the woman was the head of the tech offices of a technology company.  Then again, some people preferred paper to a computer or tablet.  Maybe Alba was one of those people.

Darcy stood, with her back straight, just inside the doorway. 

Alba glanced up and nodded to the chair in front of her desk.  It wasn’t a particularly uncomfortable chair, but it’s clear that it wasn’t meant to be inviting.  Nobody was supposed to sit down and stay there for hours.  They were meant to get in, make a point, and get out.

Darcy sat, regretting the fact that she was wearing one of her two pencil skirts.  There was always something uncomfortable about sitting across from someone while wearing it, not to mention that for whatever reason that chair made the skirt seem tighter than it actually was.

Alba set down the papers and crossed her hands on her desk.  “What role do you see yourself having here?”

Darcy gulped.  She had taken Alba’s advice and enjoyed the weekend, and this was not a question she was expected.  The deer-in-the-headlights expression must have tipped Alba off as the other woman looked vaguely disappointed, “I’m not firing you.  Merely having trouble placing you within my department.”

Darcy sighed in relief.  As long as she still had a job, she could make something work.  “I don’t know what answer you want here.  I’m pretty good at what I do, and.”

Alba cut her off, “I know that you cannot deal with the minutia of dealing with our less technologically gifted employees, I know that you can proofread code although you say that writing it isn’t your strong suit.  I didn’t ask what you were good at.  I asked what role you could see yourself fulfilling here.” 

Alba let the silence fill the room, she was the kind of person who could be patient enough to wait until the air could be physically moved before letting up on the tension. 

This time the tension kept building, and her expression stayed the same, neutral and patiently waiting.

Meanwhile, Darcy felt like she was sweating through her blazer.  The blazer she had only just had dry-cleaned (yes she still thought it was a scam but she wasn’t living in New Mexico anymore and at least needed to pretend to be an adult.  If she bought a slurpee on her way home after picking up her dry cleaning that was nobody else’s business).  “I work well as a fact checker and I think I’ve proven that I’m good at looking through code and picking out what doesn’t work.  If there is a place in this company for someone to review other people’s work, I think I could fill it.  After years of following around an astrophysicist and proofreading concepts that I had no ability to understand I think I can handle a bit of computer work.”

She had rushed through her statement, hoping that was a decent answer.  With the number of people working in the company, she hoped she would be able to keep up the proofreading capacity with a few other responsibilities.  Just, please don’t make her deal with idiots and assholes…  There had been enough of those at Starbucks and then working the phones.

Alba nodded.  “I figured you would prefer a job similar to that.  You will still be expected to work the phones where there are a high number of complaints but I’ve received positive feedback about your work on your recent project and have had a request from our robotics wing that you continue to work with them.”

Darcy couldn’t help her spontaneous fist pump and held out her fist for fist bump before realizing that fist bumping your supervisor might not be the best idea.  Especially when said supervisor tended to not have much of a sense of humor.  Her fist was outstretched for a few seconds before she started to draw it back.  It was uncomfortable to keep it up there under Alba’s stare. 

“Sorry about that.  Thank you for the opportunity.”

Alba raised an eyebrow.  “At least you’re enthusiastic.  I’m still going to be the go-between between you and the engineers.  For the time being, nothing is being passed down.  Go assist Brad and Jill on the phones.”

Darcy nodded, trying not to let her excitement turn into the full on dancing she was tempted to do.  At her desk she sent a quick text to Jane: ‘get ready to go out for lunch, we have something to celebrate.’

‘Where are we going?’ was the almost immediate response.  Of course Jane didn’t ask what they were celebrating.

‘I want to go to the Indian Buffet!’

‘Must be something big.  Noon?’

‘yup.’

Darcy straightened up at her desk and put in her headphones.  Jarvis immediately sounded in her ear. 

“I believe congratulations are in order Ms. Lewis.”

“Thanks Jarvis,” Darcy mumbled.  Her coworkers were finally starting to arrive and even with her minor promotion (okay it might not have been a promotion but nobody was taking this new job from Darcy) Darcy still didn’t want to make a bad impression. 

“I believe our robotics department will have something for you to review by the end of the day.”

It was the best news she could have gotten!  Relief flooded through her, she knew she wouldn’t have to suffer the hell of dealing with people for too long.  Relaxing back into her seat she realized a burning question.  “Did you have anything to do with this?”

There was a pause before a short, “No.” 

Jarvis could lie.  That wasn’t terrifying.  Not at all.  Then again it was clearly on her side so, “Thanks.”

“I assure you Ms. Lewis, I had nothing at all to do with…”

“Sure thing Jarvis, I definitely believe you.  Oh look, a call is coming in.” 

She clicked the button and took the call and hoped against hope that Jill would be in soon.  She couldn’t hope that Brad would appear because even if he took the calls off of her hands, he would see it as her owing him a favor and that would not stand.  Jill however, was a sweet girl and a great person to work with.

The day turned out great.

Darcy and Jane celebrated at their favorite Indian buffet.  They waddled back to the tower comfortably over-full and hugged just inside the lobby.  Jarvis was correct in telling her that a project was on its way to her. Alba passed it on after lunch which meant that Darcy didn’t have to take any more phone calls.  Both Brad and Jill congratulated her when she put away her headset though it was more sincere coming from Jill. 

Going to self-defense was fun too.  For the first time since the unfortunate jump scare training, Sam and Natasha were there as well as Steve.  They took Darcy on a run where she, breathlessly, told them about the slight change in her job. 

As a reward they let her box, and hitting things (even if she was wearing gloves) had never felt so good.  She sparred a bit with Sam and a bit with Natasha after that, her way of telling both of them that they were truly forgiven.  After all, Darcy didn’t spar with just everyone.

Afterwards they texted Bucky, with no response, and went to grab a drink at a bar around the corner.  Steve bought a round of drinks and they all cheered to Darcy.  She spent the entire evening smiling.  There was something about being surrounded by people who cared for her and seemed legitimately excited about something good that was happening in her life.

There were a couple of rounds and at the end of the night, Darcy made it back to her apartment only a little tipsy.  The kind of tipsy that lifted the spirits.  Not quite to the point where looking in a mirror showed only a stretched out horrifying fun house mirror truth, but the kind of tipsy where looking in the mirror turned into breaking out into song and dance while attractively shaking some ass to see how everything looked.

It was a good night.

Before bed, though, she checked her phone one last time.  She sent a quick text to Bucky before she could think about it.  Nothing deep, just a ‘we missed you tonight.’ 

But in the end, his absence couldn’t dim what had been a great day.

 

That Tuesday Darcy took Steve dancing.  Some of the women there seemed disappointed that she wasn’t there with Bucky.  The disappointment was fairly short lived considering that Steve was still a pretty damn attractive man, and clearly was in need of a good instructor, which Darcy was not. 

For the first couple of songs, she had tried to get Steve to move around properly, to swing his hips and pick up his feet.  After a few songs it was clear that Darcy wasn’t the teacher he needed.

While she could do all the moves herself, there was a difference in being able to do them and being able to explain them to another person. 

In the end, she happily let some of the other girls cut in.  She kept an eye on Steve while happily twirling and jiving with a few of the older men, the guys who had been dancing their entire lives and moved like they breathed, without effort. 

He may have switched partners every song or two but it was clear that Steve was having fun from the blush on his face and the looseness in his body.  Normally, the only thing that made him so loose and easy going was working out for an insane amount of time.  But here his shoulders were relaxed and he seemed to be chatting with all of his partners.  It was nice to see his fear of the ladies may have dissipated.

Darcy stole him back for a dance or two at the end of the evening, at the point where he knew enough about what he was doing that, while Darcy was still secretly leading, she also knew that he wouldn’t step on her toes.

“You’re getting some looks from the ‘dolls’ here.”  She winked at him, using the phrase that he and Bucky would sometimes casually slip into conversation.

This turned the blush on his face from a light healthy pink to a deeper almost crimson color.  “I think I’ve had enough dancing partners for tonight.”

Darcy snorted, “Pretty sure you been with every lady in the room, even Bucky can’t say that.”

Steve smiled, the red in his cheeks still fairly present.  “Actually, I think I might be taken?”

“Might be?  I feel like one should know if one is taken.”  Darcy said, wondering about the phrasing.

“We haven’t, we haven’t actually talked about it, and I don’t want to ruin a good thing.”

Darcy pushed herself into a twirl and spun around Steve before lacing their hands back together.  In the modern era of dating that didn’t seem like a situation that was particularly far out.  “Kind of surprised that works for you.”

“I didn’t think it would either,” Steve took the initiative and spun Darcy around before picking her up and spinning.  “But it does.  It’s new enough that, well, I’m just happy.”

Looking at him that much was clear.  There was less stress building up around his body, he seemed looser and the smiles were coming more often now than they ever had.  Clearly, at least some of that was due to having Bucky back and closer to his original personality, but some of it had to be the team and finding his place in the world.  Finding his place with another person clearly wouldn’t hurt.

Darcy grinned evily.  “Have I met her?”

Steve frowned ever so slightly.  “I have no idea if you have met them.”

“Ah, well, I guess I can’t give them the shovel talk.”

Steve laughed, “The fact that you think you need to give the shovel talk to someone I date is,”

Darcy cut him off, “You may be a supersoldier, and you may have the Avengers on your side, but never underestimate the power of a girl who has been taught self-defense by said super soldier and owns a tricked out taser.  I might not be able to strike the fear of god into a person but I can definitely strike the fear of Darcy into a person.”

The song ended as he said, “If I ever need help burying a body and Natasha isn’t available, I’ll come find you.”

“That’s all I asked for.”  She patted his shoulder.

She skipped her normal post-dancing ritual.  It wouldn’t feel right getting milkshakes without Bucky.  But Steve made sure she made it safely back to her apartment and asked, “Can we do this again?  It was a fun evening.”

“Of course Steve, though you have to know I’m gonna be grilling you about your mystery love interest.” 

“I promise it’s not that mysterious.”

“We’ll see about that.”  Darcy let a slight crazed glint enter her eyes.  It was the same look she got when she worked on the data from SHIELD, or worked on the programming for Bucky’s arm, or any number of things, and Steve recognized the look.  He shook his head, half in resignation and half in amusement.  He was friends with stubborn people, and should have expected something like this.

“Just don’t tell Natasha.”

“You’re taking my best resource away from me Rogers.”

“If you can’t find out anything without Natasha do you really deserve to know?”

“Touche, I’ll just do some internet stalking.”

“Darcy…”

“Kidding, I promise.  I’m just glad you’re happy.”

His gaze went off a little into the distance, clearly imagining his fairy tale person. 


	23. Something Old or Something New

It took a couple of days for Bucky to respond.  A fact that was worrying only because normally it only took him a couple of hours.  But, Darcy also knew that Bucky had a life.  Plus, having worked on the code for his arm, she was sure that Tony Stark was chomping at the bit to show off a new invention.

The funny thing was, even knowing (or at least expecting) that Bucky had a new arm, didn’t make it easy to notice.  He had always carried himself in such a way to minimize the attention that his arm would get.  The long sleeves, and the adjustment to his stature (he would overcompensate to hide the arm’s weight), but all that practice made it hard to notice the difference.

That Friday, after he came back from his ‘vacation,’ It took Darcy a stunningly long amount of time to remember that he had probably had his arm switched out and that she was dying to have a look. 

Then again, she wasn’t sure how to breach the topic.  Visually, there wasn’t much of a difference between the old arm and the new, not that she could see.  The hand was still silver.  The gears still whirred quietly, a noise that could only be heard if one was paying attention to it.  After all, it was softer than the noise a laptop’s fan makes after the computer had been on for a while.  Darcy had only heard the noise because she, Bucky and Steve had been in a room that lacked any sort of outside stimulus.    

With the paintjob looking the same, and the noises being similar, and the articulation of the joints was as smooth as ever, it was difficult to notice the difference.

It wasn’t until Darcy saw Bucky walking around his apartment that she saw where the difference was.

He wasn’t adjusting to the weight of the arm, he seemed lighter on her feet.  Moving the way he would when he danced, but just walking around.  It wasn’t the same prowling she had seen from the footage of the disaster in DC, or the way he would wander around.  It seemed like he wasn’t conscious that the arm was foreign.  

For all the pretending he had done before, the metal arm had never seemed natural, and now only days later it did.  All that Darcy wanted to do was ask about it.  She wanted to see the arm, have a chance to touch it, look at where it connected with his shoulder to see if they’d managed anything less invasive than what he had before.

But it wasn’t her place.

He hadn’t told her about it yet.

He hadn’t wanted to let her know about it.  Whatever reason he had for not giving her an update about a big change in her life, she couldn’t push it.  That realization though, that he either didn’t trust her or didn’t want to tell her something important.  It made her insides ache.  The ache wasn’t centered around her heart and it wasn’t centered in her head or her throat.  It was this pulling, pulsing pit that ran from navel to sternum. 

She swallowed hard and tried to push all of the new information down.  If he was adjusting to a new arm, and didn’t want to tell her, she very clearly shouldn’t push.  So, instead, she continued on like she hadn’t found out new and startling information.

They watched the James Bond movies she had left some time before.  They were movies she thought he would enjoy, being a wise-cracking guy from the 40’s.  There was something about his personality pre-war that seemed like he would enjoy the sometimes ludicrous adventures.

And, now that he was further into his recovery, she knew he wouldn’t be set off by seeing guns, or the outlandish scheme.  Though compared to Hydra, James Bond villains almost seemed tame.  At least most of them weren’t literal Nazis. 

Plus, this meant they could have in-depth discussions as to who the best Bond was.  After all, much like your first batman, nobody forgot their first Bond.  (Darcy did make them watch out of order.  If you didn’t forget your first Bond it better be Sean Fucking Connery).

And it worked, Sean Connery did end up being his favorite.  He was walking her to the door so she could catch a cab when he suddenly seemed a bit nervous.  It showed in the way he ran his hand (the metal one) through his hair and how he couldn’t look her in the eye.

“So, Stark is holding a gala in a few weeks, and I, I’m a little worried about whether I can handle it.”  He breathed in deep and Darcy anticipated the question.

“Yeah, I’ll go with you.”

“You will?”  He sighed out in relief. 

She shrugged, “Of course, dummy.  I used to go to a ton with Steve to get Natasha off of his back.  If I can talk him down from freaking out about dancing I’m pretty sure I can get you through shaking the hands of some old ladies.”

He snorted a little bit, “I’m not sure even you could get the punk past his fear of dancing.”

She gave him a side eye in the elevator.  “We went swing dancing on Tuesday and that seemed to go fine.  I think he picked up all your admirers.”

“You went swing dancing without me?”  He seemed almost, hurt? 

She tilted her head, “Yeah, we already made plans to take Steve dancing and after you bailed it didn’t seem fair to cancel on him.  Don’t worry I made sure to protect his reputation.  We were home before midnight.”

The joke didn’t seem to have the desired effect.  He still seemed hurt and Darcy honestly couldn’t understand why.  It wasn’t like she had been the one to disappear off the face of planet for a few days.  It wasn’t like she was the one who had had a major surgery done without telling anyone.  With a little introspection Darcy could tell that she was still irritated by that, but his disappointment still didn’t make any sense to her. 

Dancing had always been something fun that the two of them had done together.  Was it the fact that she had taken Steve?

The furrow in his brow had lessened, though Darcy thought that was due to him forcing it away, adopting a neutral face.  “How’s the punk do?”

Darcy huffed, “Well I had to pass him off to his adoring horde of women because, how do I put this?  For a guy who can be so light on his feet out in the field, he can be incredibly heavy footed when it comes to something non-life-threatening.”

That finally got his mood to lift, or at least he made it seem that way.  “Then he hasn’t changed at all.  You put him in front of a pretty girl and he falls apart.”

She smiled, “In this case I don’t think it’s the pretty girls.  Like I said, I managed to get him through a few galas so he has some basic dancing down, but,” she shrugged, “swing is a little bit more complicated.”

“Not if you’ve got the right rhythm.”  He smirked. 

She rolled her eyes and patted him on the shoulder before getting in the cab.  “I’ll see you later, Barnes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for how short this one is. Next week is longer and pretty damn exciting though!


	24. Suits, Suits, Suits, Suits

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is late. The weekend kind of kicked my ass. I hope you enjoy!

Darcy tried to let the strange moment with Bucky get out her head.  And she was overwhelmingly successful.  There were so many other things going on.  Her training with Steve and Natasha was bumping up.  Mostly in that now they would make teams of two against one.  Darcy was always on the team of two because none of them were under the impression that should could take on either of the fighters on her own.  But working against Steve to work on getting hits in, working against Natasha to work on speed and stealth, was great.  Working with a much more talented fighter meant that Darcy had to think on her feet to be a help rather than a hindrance.

And finally, she had stopped complaining about the workouts, partially because she could see the muscle growth.  It hadn’t changed her figure, she still had all of her curves, and the extra weight around her middle but she could see the muscles in her arms and feel some abs underneath the soft of her belly. It was nice to know that she was getting stronger.

On top of training, there was always work, which had kicked into another high gear.  She wasn’t pulling the same late nights that had felt forced to do while working on Bucky’s arm, but she was working all day long on reviewing coding for a few different projects and was reveling in staying busy.  Add on trying to keep Jane from overworking herself (the new intern was great at a lot of things, but didn’t always have the backbone to pull Jane away from her work), the occasional happy hour with coworkers, the odd meetup with a college friend, and picking up projects from time to time from her online group and it was pretty busy schedule.

There was no point in worrying about a little piece of oddness from one of her friends, a friend she might be interested in because he was gorgeous and funny and had managed to survive conditions that may have broken other people which belied a strength that seemed rare. 

She did chuckle on Tuesday when, sore from training the previous day, all she wanted to do was fall into a couch and watch some shitty horror movies (She was torn between one of the classics or watching one of the newer Syfy monstrosities a la Sharknado or Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus) when instead it became very obvious her plan could not be completed. 

After her knock, the door opened to a fairly unnerved Bucky.  “What do people wear to a party in this day in age?”

Darcy laughed, though it was tinged with a hint of regret.  There wasn’t a couch in her immediate future.  She texted Natasha, ‘any chance you’re up for a shopping trip tonight?’ If she was going to take Bucky suit shopping she needed backup.  Getting his body into a suit was going to kill her if she wasn’t careful.  Plus, it was Natasha, Darcy didn’t know a single person who knew how to play dress up better.

The answer was an immediate yes with an address.  “I don’t know what the fashion is in men’s suits, but I know Natasha can help us.” 

The panicked look in his eyes quelled slightly.  “Why didn’t I ask her?”

“Fear makes a person do funny things.” Darcy added sagely. 

Shopping ended up being a ton of fun, even if it was a constant test of Darcy’s libido and willpower.  And, of course, Natasha knew what was in fashion for men’s suits.  They walked into the store like Natasha owned the place (and let’s be honest, between her looks and personalities she could put on – Natasha could own anyone and anything that she wanted to) and Natasha went to the first employee she could find. 

“I want a single breasted suit in the most stunning blue color you have.” 

Darcy dropped Bucky’s hand and gave Natasha a raised eyebrow.  “Blue?”

She smirked, “It’s a Stark gala.  Tony always wears something outrageous so we can dress Bucky up a little bit and not have to worry about him getting too much attention.”  She turned back to the employee and gave him a few other requirements before following him around the store giving him her opinion. 

Meanwhile Darcy went to look around at some of the different styles.  A purple suit seemed pretty out there as did the subtle paisley pattern that seemed to be in style.  There was a feeling of being watched that followed her around the store.  She was so used to the feeling that she didn’t flinch.  After all, Bucky was just being his normal slightly paranoid self.  He did have a tendency on keeping an eye on the people around him, especially the people who would be more easily threatened.

The first time she had noticed it, she had been a little bit irritated.  She had lived in DC for a while with no problem, had managed to survive a college campus for four years taking care of herself and here was this guy who thought he needed to keep an eye on her.  Eventually it became a bit comforting.  It wasn’t that he didn’t think she could protect herself.  He was just making sure that if she did need help, he would know about it.  One extra layer of security never hurt, after all.

His eyes followed her as she browsed all the different suits.  Natasha called him back and Darcy rolled her shoulders, this was going to be a trying evening.

Distracting herself by touching every fabric (they were all so silky, so fancy) she almost didn’t hear Natasha call her to the changing room for an opinion.  Darcy knew very well that Natasha didn’t actually need Darcy’s opinion.  When Darcy went shopping the criteria for buying something boiled down to; why doesn’t this have pockets, is it comfortable, and that was it.  Darcy knew how to shop for her own shape but didn’t really have an opinion otherwise.  She managed to class it up for work but that’s, yet again, because of Natasha’ influence. 

If it was up to Darcy, she thought, she would wear skinny jeans and sweaters every day of the week.  Unfortunately, even SI had a dress code.  Even with the IT department being a little bit more lax than other departments, her jeans with the hole in the knee and her oversized sweaters weren’t quite welcome there.

As she walked back, Natasha’s face was a touch too innocent.  “What are you up to?”

Natasha’s face went the scary type of blank, which would have scared the shit out of Darcy the first time they met, but was now old hat.  After you’ve seen it being used to get the last slice of cheese pizza it becomes a little less intimidating.  “What makes you think I’m up to something?”

Darcy didn’t bother to answer, just walked through the hallway into the fanciest changing room she had ever seen.  There were comfortable seats for everyone waiting, and there were actual rooms with plush carpeting and miniature chandeliers, and there was a glorious mirror.  But none of that was important because Darcy may or may not have been knocked flat at Bucky’s ass in a proper suit.

It wasn’t that she hadn’t already appreciated it; she had already noticed he looked good in sweats and jeans.  But in a suit… There was something about a man in a finely tailored suit that pushed all of the right buttons.  It was embarrassing to admit but even Agent iPod stealer had had something nice going on, which Darcy had never told anyone because she was still bitter about how long he had kept it (receiving it in the mail a month and a half later hadn’t negated the time she hadn’t had it!). 

And right now, Bucky was looking fine. 

“Damn Natasha.”  Darcy muttered as Natasha stepped up beside her.  “Good work.” 

Bucky turned around, having heard the comment, a surprisingly shocked smiled on his face, “What, no kudos to me?”

“You sir, are wearing the hell out of that suit, good enough?”  Darcy offered, brain still operating only on half capacity.  The other half was watching the way his metal hand fiddled with the cuff before Natasha walked up and fixed it for him. 

The blue suit was particularly stunning and with his hair loose but slightly slicked back; begging to have a hand run through it.  He was going to be so popular at the gala. 

“Needs a black shirt.”  Natasha said after making a round.  “No tie, you don’t need to look that formal.”

That appeared to be good news.  “Ties are choking hazards.”

Natasha gave him a sultry look, “They have other uses too.”  His posture automatically mimicked hers and Darcy couldn’t help but to appreciate the pretty picture that they made, even with Natasha being outfitted simply. Their bodies seemed to naturally curl around each other. If Natasha didn’t have a complicated history with Bucky, and wasn’t dating Sam, Darcy would have tried to push them together.  At least that’s what she told herself.  Lucky for her, that wasn’t the universe that she lived in. 

“Now,” Natasha smacked him on the arm and he pulled back with an outraged expression that reminded Darcy of a cat, “go try on the next one.” 

“What?” He held out his arms and gestured in a ‘do you see this’ kind of way, “What’s wrong with this?”

“Nothing.”  Natasha walked towards one of the couches and primly sat down, crossing a leg and patting a seat next to her, “But it’s always a good idea of have options, Barnes.”

Darcy sat next to her, silently thanking her and cursing her for giving her the opportunity to ogle at Bucky in a variety of suits.

And ogle they did.  He tried on a number of suits, and while none were quite as good as the first one, the gray and black did look pretty damn good.  There was a silver suit as well which Natasha immediately said no to, “looks too much like something Stark would wear.”

It helped that Bucky was a good sport.  After the first suit he realized that he was playing a role, and he may have hammed it up, just a little bit.  At first he just added a small spin, but after three suits he pulled off the coat and swung it over his shoulder before leering at the two women on the couch. 

Darcy was giggling hard enough that she was happy that no one else had walked into the room. 

Finally, Natasha was done.  She shoo’d Darcy out of the changing room and helped Bucky decide which suit to get.  Darcy was busy playing Candy Crush while they took care of the whole business of paying for the suits and making an appointment for last minute alterations.  


	25. I already want a burger

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your comments! I loved getting them. The past week-and-a-half have been crazy. I accepted a job, retook the GMAT, and went for a full day of business school interviews. I didnt' have my computer over the weekend so I'm sorry this is a bit late. That being said, this is an exciting chapter

As the gala came closer, Darcy started to get more excited.  While she didn’t necessarily fit into a normal gala crowd, there was something incredibly fun about getting dolled up for it.  Plus she had talked to Jane who, as a leading astrophysics researcher at Stark Industries, had also been asked to go, and it was always fun to get Jane ready for something fancy. 

Bucky hadn’t seemed to mind the idea of having two women on his arm for his entrance to the gala either. 

The morning of the gala Darcy pushed Jane out of bed and shuffled her onto the subway.  Getting Jane into a chair at the salon was a completely different matter.

“I don’t understand why I have to get my hair done.” 

Darcy rolled her eyes.  Jane was pitching a fit over how big a waste of time it was for her to get her hair done, the same way she often did.  Exasperated amusement, that what Darcy had to remember, she might be exasperated, but it was oh so Jane.

“I’m not the now-famous scientist that everyone wants a piece of because I haven’t been seen in public since a conference a few months ago where I was stolen away by a genius to work at his company.”

“But…”  Jane had to pause to think, which is when Darcy continued to push her into the chair.

“It’s a fundraiser for the Avengers, which your boyfriend is still on, even if he is currently off-planet.  There will be pictures taken of you, and I will be damned if you don’t look nice.”

“What about you?”

Darcy snorted, “I always look good.”  After saying that, she could only remember all the times she had forgotten to take off her makeup before going to bed, or what she looked like in the mirror when she crashed at Bucky’s apartment when she was sick… she normally looked good.  But she wasn’t going to say that to Jane. 

“You’ll be in pictures too.”

“As part of a crowd.  Look, I haven’t made a name for myself in any field that will matter tonight, and it’s not like I’m attached to anyone important.”

“Weren’t you ‘dating’ Steve at the last function like this you went to?  Don’t you think someone will notice you’re on Bucky’s arm this time?”

Now that was a good point.  She hadn’t realized that there might be some sort of overlap.  “Well,” she was trying to think on her feet, “I think Steve mentioned there’s someone he’s interested in. Hopefully I can just play jilted lover?”

“Who moved on with his best friend?”

“Technically, it hasn’t been in the news that Bucky Barnes is back.  They’ve kept it pretty quiet, and how many people will think that a guy from the 40’s came back to life.”

“Steve did.” Jane raised an eyebrow challenging Darcy to argue. 

“Fuck,”  Darcy sat in the chair next to Jane.  “I’m getting my hair done, aren’t I?”

“If I have to sit through it…”  Jane let the sentence dangle, knowing Darcy could fill in the rest. 

The day was filled with primping and preening, most of it begrudgingly done. At some point Darcy had given in and called Natasha.  While she could doll herself up, Jane was a completely different matter.  The woman had pitched a fit over everything Darcy was trying to do, so, the cavalry was called.

It took a while but finally they were all dressed.  Natasha disappeared to finish getting ready and Darcy and Jane were just lounging around Darcy’s apartment in their fancy dresses waiting to get picked up. 

“Ugh, I already want a burger.”  Darcy ran a hand over her stomach, bemoaning the fact that they had been too busy to eat.

“I don’t think this is the kind of party with burgers.”  Jane added forlornly, “maybe we could stop somewhere to get one on the way over?”

Bucky did like burgers, “Depends, I can’t tell if he’s the kind of person who would appreciate being ‘fashionably late.’” Honestly, he probably would have been, back in the day at least.  Would have wanted to make a big entrance, make sure all the pretty girls knew he was there.  If he was still interested in something like that now, it was more likely he’d want to sneak in a side door to avoid the worst of the attention.  He didn’t have the same problems being out in public that he had early on; the lessening fugue states and violent mood swings helped with that.  But it didn’t change the fact that he didn’t like getting attention for his metal arm, or his personal history.

Darcy looked at the clock.  They had about twenty minutes before Bucky was supposed to pick them up.  “It might not be a burger, but it used to be considered liquid bread.”  She pulled the cheap IPA’s she had out of her refrigerator and threw one to Jane, who just barely managed to catch it before it would have landed in her lap.  “Open that away from your dress.”  Darcy added on at the last minute.  A shaken beer could be a foamy beer, and after the work she had put in…

Bucky rang the doorbell only ten minutes later.  Darcy chugged the last third of her beer while opening the door, then tried to hide the can behind her back.  It was clear she hadn’t been subtle when she was met with a raised eyebrow and a smirk. 

“Pregaming a fancy dance.  I never would have expected that from you.”

“Maybe not with beer.  I also have tequila, does that fit the image a little better?”

“Hi James,”  Jane waved, still sitting on Darcy’s futon.  Her dress was the slightest bit poofy and would be easy to move around it, but might take a little work to get vertical. 

“Is there one for me?”

“Of course.”  Darcy grabbed him a beer and went to give Jane a hand.  “Any chance we could drive through for burgers or something?  Jane and I may have forgotten to eat before we put on our party dresses.”  She waved at the green lace dress that she had gotten for one of the DC evenings. 

It was like Bucky hadn’t seen what she was wearing before that moment.  He slowly looked her up and down, smile growing as her saw the heels and the lace, the way the dress hugged her stomach, the way her breasts seemed to perfectly fill it out, her light makeup and perfectly styled hair, and his eyes...  His eyes went heavy lidded, a sultry look.  Combined with his smile it made every part of Darcy stand on end.

Meanwhile Jane was glancing between the two of them, clearly putting something together.  Darcy had to break the moment because it seemed like Bucky wasn’t going to.  “So, burgers?”

He didn’t startle, and his eyes didn’t lose any of their intensity but the smile changed to something a little bit lighter, “Yeah.  McDonalds work?  I think there’s one on the way there.”

“Why does the look on your face say that you’re trying to piss someone off?”

“The look on Stark’s face when I walk into his gala with two gals on my arms and a McDonalds burger in each hand?  Gonna be worth every penny.”

Darcy grinned, it would be pretty glorious.  And it was, when the walked into the gala, Jane hid her burger in her purse, but Darcy was happily downing a vanilla milkshake while Bucky ate his French Fries.  They functioned as a good excuse to get out of shaking hands and standing around for pictures.

Once inside, past the press of all the people they threw away the refuse and started giggling.  Jane rolled her eyes, knowing that while the two of them could goof off, she would be spending the evening talking to people who were only pretending to be interested in the Einstein-Rosen bridge.  Sometimes it was tough to be a genius. 

There were only five other people in the entirety of SI that seemed to be able to understand what she was doing, and had some level of interest in it.  It was a disappointing ratio, at least to Jane.  She walked into the room, leaving Darcy and Bucky amusing themselves in the front door. 

While their little stunt had managed to keep them from having to talk to people, it was still possible that they would end up in the papers (this was a pretty popular event after all – a fundraiser held by Tony Stark for the Maria Stark Foundation, good publicity for anyone involved), and now that they were finished with their food they did need to go and talk to some people. 

Darcy looked at Bucky, he was a little bit tense which was shown only in how still he was.  There was no fidgeting of his hands, no running his hands through his hair, not even a transfer of weight from foot to foot.  “Think we can find out who Steve’s new love interest is tonight?”

That shocked him out of his stillness, “Stevie’s got a girl?”

She shrugged, “He has someone.  At least that’s what he told me.”

He grabbed her hand and took her to the left to find a side entrance to the ballroom.  In any space meant for entertaining as large as the one they were at, there would be numerous side entrances to relieve the flow of people and make it easier for the staff to get around.  Without any sort of trouble, Bucky maneuvered his way through to find an entrance where they wouldn’t be notice. 

Darcy was floored, and while Bucky dragged her forward she took the time to enjoy the way the lights embedded in the ceiling managed to highlight the architecture, and the way that the chandelier’s seemed to dazzle.  The only way to describe it was grand. 

All she managed to do while Bucky found Steve was grab a glass of champagne off of one of the trays.  The booze was free and she was going to take advantage of that.  There were also some little snack bites and she was dying to try one of those (she hadn’t ended up getting a burger and Bucky ate most of her French fries) but the hand not holding champagne was being held captive by Bucky. 

The whirl of colors on the dance floor was impressive for how early in the evening it was.  Apparently this was

an event where the women got really jazzed up.  If Darcy had cared more, she might have felt a little bit too plain in her lace dress.  But, she was still there mostly for moral support, this was a paycheck she might actually cash (unlike that last few that came in that immediate got tossed into a drawer never to be seen again).  There was something about heels and a tight dress that made earning a bit of money way easier to handle. 

And there was Steve.  He was talking animatedly to Tony Stark who seemed to have a fond expression on his face.  “Steve, what’s this I hear about you finding yourself a dame?”

That caught both men’s attention, but neither looked too happy about the interruption.  Steve gave Darcy a look which she gave a helpless shrug to.  He hadn’t mentioned that his relationship was meant to be secret, though he had mentioned it should be kept on the down low.  The only lucky thing about the situation was that Bucky did have volume control and hadn’t shouted it to the room. 

Still, Steve shook Bucky’s hand and pulled him off to the side of the room.  With both hands finally free, Darcy knocked back a good portion of her champagne and grabbed a snack off the nearest tray. 

“How’s the champagne?”  Stark asked.

She swallowed, “Well, I’m used to $5 bottles of wine so I get the feeling this far enough out of my league that my having any opinion on it would be an insult to it, so…”  she knocked back the rest.  “It’s drinkable.”

That got the first real smile she had ever gotten from the man.  “Well, if it’s drinkable, let’s get you a refill.”  They walked over to the bar and Darcy felt strange that she was being escorted by her boss.  There were many things to know about Tony Stark; he was a genius, incredibly rich, powered the Iron Man suit, and so much more.  But the one truth about Tony Stark was something that was said constantly.  The man was charismatic, but until being the one with his whole attention it’s impossible to understand how charismatic he was.  And yet that wasn’t the case.  If he wanted you to know that he was paying attention, he could make it feel like you were the only person in the world.

It wasn’t clear how much of that was a persona that he wore for events like this, and how much of it was his intrinsic personality.  But either way, being in his presence was intimidating. 

He waved the bartender over and ordered her another champagne and two club sodas.  The three drinks were prepared in almost no time.  And suddenly there was nothing to distract his gaze off of her, a gaze that was starting to make her antsy.

“I see you downgraded to Barnes, now.”  Stark started, his tone of voice smooth as if he hadn’t insulted her and Bucky in a single sentence.  This may have been the man who paid her paycheck, but it didn’t give him the right to be a dick.

“I see you finally forgave Steve for not immediately telling you that James killed your parents.” 

The flinch was tiny, a crinkling at the eyes and a twitch of the mouth, but it was there.  “You know about that.”  It wasn’t a question.

“I helped Natasha with the SHIELD information.  Of course I do.”

He took a sip of one of the club sodas, and the silence lasted five seconds longer than was comfortable.  “I take it you also figured out what the big project you were double checking a while back was for.”

She nodded.  “People tend to underestimate me because I have some pretty nice assets, but that doesn’t mean they’ve replaced having a brain.”

He thought about that for a second and tilted his head.  “And you chose Barnes over Steve?”

“I think we both know I’m not Steve’s type.”  She said graciously, already wishing she had another champagne.  Every part of this back and forth felt like a test. 

Tony leaned against that bar, the silver suit shimmering prettily underneath the dim lights. 

“So you moved onto his best friend?”

Wracking her brain for the story they had originally set up Darcy tried to make the sentences flow, “At the point where Steve and I knew nothing was going to happen he asked if I would help Bucky adjust.  It moved on from there.”  She shrugged, trying to make it sound casual, especially considering there was a surprising amount of truth to it.

Steve hadn’t been going to as many parties and didn’t need a date, he had asked Darcy to help Bucky with the modern world, and her relationship with Bucky had moved from strangers to friends.  Yet, when people looked at the two of them, Darcy was playing the role of girlfriend.  A role she was starting to think she wouldn’t mind playing.  Except…

Except that given her role in his recovery, it would be taking advantage of him if they were in a relationship.  He had been vulnerable with her in a way she felt he wouldn’t have been with other people.  Besides, he was still recovering.  Harmless flirting aside, she hadn’t seen him make an actual move on anyone.

From the corner of her eye, Darcy saw Sam and Natasha waltzing gracefully on the dance floor.  Darcy tried not to smile at them, but it was clear that Natasha had most of the grace and that Sam was just following her lead. 

Tony followed her line of sight and saw the couple as well.  “Looks like most of the people I asked to be here to help schmooze have arrived.”  He took another sip of his drink. 

“Almost all?  I notice the archer is missing.”

He huffed, “If I’m trying to convince people to part with their money, I don’t think the walking mess of a person is going to be too helpful there.  I gave him some new arrows and time in the range to make sure he didn’t come.”

“Aww, I owe him a drink.”

Tony gave her a look, “You do have a habit of collecting us, don’t you?”

Darcy inhaled slowly, and tried to control her breathing.  She couldn’t help the way her fists curled up into balls.  Quietly, but to his face, she said, “Fuck you Mr. Stark.”  And put her empty glass on the bar before leaving to find literally anyone else. 

She grabbed another drink off of a tray and made her way to where she saw Bucky and Steve still talking.  Pasting on her best smile, she stood near them and wound her hand into Bucky’s arm, playing into the image of a happy couple.  Strangely the conversation seemed to have been dropped just as she came over. 

Clearly it was going to be a frustrating night, though not in the way she had originally expected.

“Dance with me?”  She asked Bucky, who of course said yes. 

They walked to the dance floor and fairly effortlessly managed to merge in with the other couples.  It was another dance that Bucky knew well enough to lead, and Darcy knew well enough to not trip over his feet.  They wouldn’t win any competitions, but they wouldn’t be obviously out of place. 

She hadn’t done as good a job as she thought hiding her anger, “Are you okay?”

She tried to soften her grip on his hand and breathed deeply before pasting on another fake smile.  “I’ll be fine.  Just let some asshole get to me.”

He looked around the ballroom, taking in the people there until his eyes landed on Stark still leaning against the bar like he didn’t have a care in the world.  “Was it Stark?”

“Drop it, please.”  She said tersely.  She didn’t want this to become A Thing.  The night was to raise money for a good cause and Darcy wasn’t going to be the reason that didn’t happen.  Besides, if Bucky was going to become a more official part of the Avengers, he was going to need to be on good terms with one of its founding members.  Also she just cursed at her boss, and the last thing she wanted to think about was the possibility that she might not be employed come Monday morning.

They danced for another song before Darcy realized she was failing her duties as a good date, “What did Steve have to say?”

His face soured, “Wants to keep the relationship quiet.”

“He told me that too.” Darcy said, it hadn’t seemed strange for someone so in the spotlight to want to keep things private. 

“But it’s not right.”  Bucky seemed distressed.  “If you’re seeing someone, you should be shouting it from the rooftops, not trying to make sure anyone knows.  It’s a coward’s way out.”

“I forget you don’t read the tabloids.  Famous people don’t really have that option.  When the news break, doesn’t matter who it is, they’re gonna get mobbed.  Not everyone wants to invite that into their house.”  Darcy thought for a second.  “It can be hard to read horrible things about yourself constantly.  I know that and my only experience was the school chatboards that were not as heavily monitored as my middle school principal wanted us all to believe.”

That sentence seemed to confuse him in every way.  “What did people say?”

She hand waved a little bit, “Same things asshole middle-schoolers always say.”  This wasn’t the right topic for the night.  “So, what do you think of the music choices for tonight?”

He cocked an ear to take in what they were dancing to.  “I mean, it’s a waltz.  Safe choice but not particularly interesting.”

She snorted, “You and your classical music.”

He grinned, “It’s the 40’s doll.  There was plenty of other music, but Ma liked her classical.  Would have gotten us all piano lessons if they hadn’t been so expensive.”

“I had a foster family that wanted all their kids to be musical.  I was such a disappointment.  Couldn’t even play the recorder they gave everyone in the third grade.” 

“How bad could you be?”

“Hot Crossed Buns was unintelligible.” 

He laughed at that.  “I might need to see that at some point.”

He twirled her around.  “Any recordings were deleted by yours truly as soon as I figured out how, and you’d have to have some pretty big blackmail on me to make it happen now.”

And with that, Darcy was able to put the unfortunate encounter with her boss behind her.  The evening was a ton of fun.  Sam cut in for a dance and the two of them decided to exaggerate all of their moves while Bucky and Natasha flowed around them like the moon around the Earth.  Darcy and Bucky stood by the food table for a few minutes watching Steve greet little old ladies. 

The women weren’t necessarily forward but it seemed like a number of them had met him during their USO days, and from Steve’s blush and following laughter those stories were either true and involved some level of indecency or these women were making shit up to make Captain America enjoy his evening.  It was clear from the stories they were telling that they knew it would be hard to make the real Captain America uncomfortable.  Either way, it was a golden way to spend a couple of minutes while eating a few shrimp puffs and pieces of bacon-wrapped chicken. 

Time passed and it was starting to get late.  The party had wound down so that there were only a few people left, but these were all the fun people.  Jane had finally ditched the last person who wanted to pretend that they were interested in her research and joined Darcy, Sam, and Natasha on the dance floor.  For all that Natasha was an incredibly graceful dancer, she could also be a bit of a goofball.  She and Sam started a dance fight which is where Darcy realized that Sam had a pretty decent sprinkler while Natasha broke out moves like someone who had seen a couple of breakdancing videos wanted to emulate that but just couldn’t.  Darcy was laughing really hard when the crack of thunder hit. 

Both she and Jane’s heads popped up like Meercats in the wilderness.  They looked at each other and grinned.  It was a clear night, there was no forecast of bad weather.  It could mean only one thing.

They raced each other to the doors, but before they made it there, Thor showed up in the doorway.  Darcy gave Jane her moment.  The moment where she ran to Thor and jumped in his arms, ignoring the way the metal of his ‘formal uniform’ pressed harshly into her skin.

Darcy gave them a whole minute to have their movie-worthy kiss and dramatic reunion before interrupting them.  “Hey, big guy, let her breathe!”  Thor gently set Jane down, Jane who still had stars in her eyes, before turning to Darcy and wrapping her into a tight hug. 

He set her down and she smacked his arm.  “Where have you been?”

He leaned in and quietly said, “Things are not well in Asgard.  I came for a visit as it has been to long since the Lady Jane and I have been reunited but I cannot stay for an extended period of time.”

Quietly Darcy hissed, “If you’re leaving again you better leave some fucking contact information.”

He nodded with a slight smile, “It appears I had overlooked that after my last departure, but know this.  I will not leave for such a long time again.” 

Darcy smiled widely.  “Good, we’ve missed you!”

She stepped back again to let Jane enjoy the reunion.  It was a little strange to watch your friend get it on with an actual god, but hey, no judgement.  Jane deserved someone as hot as Thor and with the additional golden retriever personality, who could say no. 

She left the two of them entangled near the doorway before returning to the ever-shrinking dance floor. 

“You know Thor?”  Steve asked from the sidelines where he was perched at one of the tables and seemed to be enjoying a late night coffee. 

“Did you not look into any of the SHIELD documents? I was Jane’s intern back when Thor first landed.  We discovered him, well, and tazed him, and hit him with a car… but he’s fine.”  She shook her head like tazing someone and hitting them with a car wasn’t a big deal.

The music changed into something a little more swing and dancing excitedly turned to Bucky.  This was going to be his time to shine.  He grabbed her and they started moving together.  “You hit Thor with a car?”

“That was Jane.”  Darcy fondly thought back to those days.  It was a simpler world full of poptarts and groggy mornings after late night stargazing. “I just tazed him.”

“What were you thinking?”  He spun her around.

“A huge drunk guy was stumbling around and yelling, and if someone was going to get hurt it was better him than me or Jane.”  It was nonchalant, because that was the way she thought.  Just because someone was bigger didn’t mean that they had all the power.  Especially in the case of someone who seemed like they were inviting trouble, Darcy wasn’t going to let that kind of person bring her down.

“I don’t know if I should be worried or proud that that doesn’t seem like a big deal to you.”

She shrugged, “After aliens invade, and then elves invade, not the cool ones from lord of the rings, asshole ones from space, and then you end up meeting a few people born in the 1920’s who still look like they’re in their late 20’s it all becomes old hat.”

He shook his head, picking her up and spinning around, “You have certainly lived an interesting life.”

Darcy took a quick look around.  It was pretty much just her, the Avengers, some close friends and the wait staff left in the ballroom.  “Pretty sure that’s true of most of the people here.”  Steve was smiling at the group, still sitting at his table with Bruce Banner, someone Darcy had only heard about from Jane and her occasional work with the man.  Tony Stark, asshole extrodinaire, was twirling around someone that must have been Pepper Potts.  Natasha and Sam hadn’t started swing dancing, but were slowly swaying to their own music.  Thor and Jane were still wrapped up in each other.  It seemed like only the inner circle was left, and anyone close to a superhero would have their own story sooner or later.  It was inevitable. 

The evening had finished winding its way down, the music had stopped and the lights were up.  Darcy waved goodbye to everyone and headed out, with Bucky of course.  Still playing her role, she snaked her arm through his and leaned into his shoulder.  Though the leaning was more due to her feet hurting and a long evening. 

Like Steve, he insisted that he walk her up to her apartment.  “Don’t mind the mess.”  She said as she opened her door.  She walked in and dropped her purse on her couch, pulling out her phone and putting it on the charger.  Bucky was still standing in the doorway, backlit from the light in the hallway. 

It was odd that he was still there, but he had sent the taxi driver away with a hefty tip, so it wasn’t like there was someone idling outside. 

“You coming in?”  She asked and he did.  He strode the five steps over to her slid his hands from her neck up into her still styled hair and did the last thing Darcy expected of the evening.  He kissed her. 

It was the kind of kiss that fit all the clichés; he kissed like he needed her to breathe, like he was dying of thirst and she was an oasis.  He kissed her like he had been thinking about it daily for some time and while he didn’t want it to end, he couldn’t wait to kiss her again.  And her body reacted.  It was impossible not to. 

And yet her head was racing. 

This was a complicated situation.  He was still paying her to spend time with him as his guide to the modern world.  Even if she wasn’t accepting the checks anymore did he think she was some kind of prostitute?  And, she had helped him through some incredibly vulnerable times, in some ways she acted as a therapist.  Was it taking advantage of him to enter into a physical relationship, but plenty of people had sex surrogates to help them adjust from something traumatic.  As long as there were no feelings, would it be okay to act as his guide to the modern world of sex?  The decision on all of those questions wasn’t necessarily made by her mind.  It was her body.  She had been relatively celibate for a couple of months, nothing beyond a few variably successful one-night stands months ago.  Having an incredibly attractive man, who she appreciated for his humor and mind as much as his body, come on to her was hard to resist. 

“You’re like someone took all of my dirty fantasy’s and put them into a person.”  He was staring at her lips.  “Your mouth….”

Without prompting she smiled a grin that promised many things, “You like my mouth do you?  You know, it can do a number of things.” 

It was a whirlwind.  It all started with another kiss, and before she knew it Bucky had picked her up and pinned her against the wall, her legs had automatically locked around him, pushing the lace dress higher up her body.  He smoothed it even further, letting his metal hand carry all of her weight while the other explored the feel of her thighs. 

It was an evening that would make Darcy happy that she suggested he read a romance novel, however jokingly she had.  At least some of the knowledge had to have come from his days as a cad back in the 40’s, but there were certain customs that had become commonplace in the modern day that seemed like they would have been more rare back in the day. 

To say he had been shocked when she went down on him would be an understatement.  The hand in her hair was hesitant, but she knew what she was doing, and he seemed to appreciate that.  To say that she had been shocked when he kissed his way down her body and ate her out like she hadn’t experienced in a while would be an understatement. Her hand in his hair wasn’t exactly hesitant, but he hadn’t seemed to mind. 

Round one finished and they cuddled up on Darcy’s bed.  Bucky was already halfway asleep and Darcy wasn’t all that far behind. 

Promising it would never happen again would have been a stupid move.  First off, they were both sleeping in the nude and with him spooned up behind her, there was no way round two wouldn’t happen when they woke up. 

Plus, she liked the idea of being his guide to modern romance, or at least modern fucking. 

And so they slept, his metal arm draped over her waist, both of them comfortably sated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAHAHAHAHAHA remember how I said this was a slow burn. I think I was right!!! Let me know what you think.


	26. So, Uh. It's a new arm?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Little bit of fluff, little bit of angst. At this point, isn't that kind of my sweet spot?
> 
> I'm enjoying the speculation as to Steve's relationship. Thanks so much to everyone who commented!

Adding sex to their mix didn’t change things all that much.  They still hung out all the time, just now at the end of the evening Darcy would spend the night.  She had unearthed the condoms she had hidden in Bucky’s apartment when she had decided to push him towards one of the women at swing dancing. It wasn’t like she had planned ahead for the circumstances she found herself in…. she just wanted him to be prepared in case he had reason to take someone up on their offer.

But, she had unearthed the condoms and in the back of her head considered buying Bucky the Kama Sutra, because he did seem to enjoy figuring out what the two of them could do together.  Though they did have to compile a short list of things they couldn’t do: restraints on either of them took Bucky back to a bad place, neither of them particularly seemed to enjoy pain, and for clear reasons any sort of domination was off the table.  But the first time she brought out one of her toys and let him use it, he was speechless.  But the smile that followed that silence was confident in all of his skills.

It was a fun time. 

After the first few weeks of starting movies and not finishing them, Bucky finally started talking about his arm. 

“It’s uh, it’s new.”

Darcy’s eyes gleamed, “Does this mean I’m finally allowed to look at it?”

His cheeks seemed to pink, and every part of that picture seemed the slightest bit strange.  “You’ve seen it plenty.”

The look she gave him spoke volumes, all of them calling him a dumbass.  “First, it’s always dark, second you still seem uncomfortable with me looking at it so I’ve tried not to.”

He leaned forward and kissed her, a simple thank you for respecting his wishes.  Darcy may have been a little bit breathless at the end, but she’d rather be panting after a kiss than another run. 

“So?”  She reached her hands underneath his Henley and slowly pushed it up, giving him ample time to refuse her advances. 

Her hands were halfway up his stomach, Darcy was a bit busy appreciating his abs, when Bucky finally made the decision.  His hands skimmed her arms before reaching to the hem of his shirt and pulling it over his head. 

Darcy let his hands finish their wandering.  It was clear she would have plenty of time to explore and didn’t want to let anything pass her by.  When she finally finished working her way up his chest, she kissed him deeply, reassuring him that she wouldn’t hurt him. 

Leaving him a little bit dazed, Darcy finally looked at the arm.  It was a thing of beauty, all chrome and shiny, though missing the iconic red star that had seemed to haunt his every move.  Moving her hand over his, she felt the tiny flinch and realized that somehow the thing was attached to his nerve endings.  And wasn’t that a horrifying thought.  Given the arm could take more weight and more pressure than a normal human arm, that could lead to some excruciating moments.  “How sensitive are you?”  She asked, letting her fingers glide up and down the warmed metal. 

“Enough.”  He said gruffly, leaving plenty unsaid. 

She flicked one of his fingers and he pulled his arm back with an affronted look.  She laughed and grabbed his arm before kissing the offended finger.  Finally she let her hands run all the way up to his shoulder.  At this point she was practically leaning over him to get access.

His shoulder was still a mess of scars, many of them the pink of newly healed tissue.  It was impossible to tell how much of that was from the recent surgery and how much was leftover from Hydra.  She went ahead and kissed the seam between his pec and the metal shoulder.  Throughout her ministrations, Bucky held himself so tightly and so still that the it felt as if the air around him was buzzing with the strength of his unease. 

Resting her head on that seam, she tried to look him in the face, though the angle was all kinds of awkward.  Instead, she looked at the back of the couch but grabbed his other hand.  All in the name of lending comfort. 

“Looks nice.” 

He sighed, relieved that the interrogation was over.  With her head on his shoulder she could feel the relaxation soak into his skin. 

“That being said, you need to be shirtless way more.  I like the view.” 

He smiled at that, “As long as the rule applies to us both.” 

Stunned, she laughed before sitting up and taking her top off, leaving just the nice bra she had on underneath.  He stared at her bra as if that would make the thing disappear, “I said shirtless, no one said anything about bras.”  It was a challenge and they both knew it.

 

So, life went on.  Bucky started attending the Avengers dinners every week.  It was billed as a planning session but given that catastrophes weren’t exactly a weekly thing, the whole thing was clearly a cover for team bonding.  Mostly they ordered in food and got to know each other; that was a boon for the newer members like Bucky and Sam.

Bucky did try to convince Darcy that she should attend with him, making the point that she already knew half of the people there.  All it took was thinking about being in the same room as Tony Stark, the man who kept insulting her.  And yeah, she still had her job, but that didn’t exactly help any.  Plus it didn’t help that she didn’t know Dr. Banner, regardless of whether he had been a professor of note at Culver (there was definitely a little chili pepper next to his name on ratemyprofessor.com, not that Darcy had checked).

Bucky would counter with the fact that Jane attended sometimes.  But Darcy wouldn’t be swayed.  First off, Bucky seemed happy with the cover that she was his girlfriend and while they might be fucking she didn’t want to give anything away that would hint that they weren’t actually together.  Second, Jane had a reason to be there.  Between her science with Tony Stark and how close she was to getting an Einstein-Rosen bridge to function she could be useful, she could add something to the conversation.

Darcy had her snark, her taser, and a few self-defense lessons under her belt but given the level of sarcasm already found on the team, the Widow Bites, Thor’s lightning, and everyone’s ability to fight, there was no purpose in her attending. 

Eventually Bucky relented and stopped begging her to come, which was when Steve started asking. 

Darcy turned him down too.  Darcy would give him a whole list or reasons at a time; Bucky needed friends independent of her, she wasn’t Bucky’s girlfriend, she was too busy with work, she had other dinner plans.  Nothing seemed to work. 

When she told Steve that she didn’t have anything to bring to the table, he brought out his disappointed eyes, and tried to convince her that her personality and insights were all she had to bring.  Saying no to Captain America was hard, saying no to a sad Steve Rogers was even more difficult.  But Darcy persevered, she finally made up a standing event on Sunday’s. One mention of her online group and trying to stay connected had him backing off.

He didn’t know the extent of the work she had done with them, but knew that they had helped find Bucky in the first place as well as work on all of the SHIELD files.  It wasn’t a group of people that he wanted to piss off.

With the event created, Darcy had to actually keep up with it, and every Sunday would add all of her layers of protection before spending a few hours of her time trying to help with whatever projects needed help.

In a way it was a relief.  There was so much of her life that was out of her hands; that had become something out of a fantasy novel.  Hacking, her group, all of that was real.  And it was something she was good at.  So she helped Patty locate a few minor threats and aided Jerry in getting a few people who liked to spout their hatred in otherwise peaceful forums shut out of the forums completely.  Cheryl asked for someone to help compile some code, and Samuel needed someone to double check that there was a hole in the security of a company he had contracted with.

It was her escapist fantasy.  Being able to white knight a few projects for people who had managed to help her so much before. 

Though one Sunday she received a strange message from Patty.  “They’re still after it.” 

Darcy stared at the message on her monitor, the light from the computer starting to seem eerie rather than familiar in the darkening light coming in from the windows of Bucky’s apartment. 

“What do you mean?”  she typed back, but Patty was already offline.  That question would have to wait until next Sunday.  There were too many “its” in this context.  If it was an item, it could have been almost anything.  If it was a person, that didn’t exactly clear anything up either.  She was friends with superheroes.  Steve had pissed off plenty of people, as had Bucky and Thor. 

Trying to put it out her head, she put the finishing touches on some code, sent it back to Cheryl and decided to watch some good old fashioned Netflix.

The door was well oiled and didn’t make noise when Bucky opened it, but it shut fairly heavily.  The crack made Darcy jump.  Darcy wasn’t normally a jumper; loud noises and oncoming objects didn’t normally phase her, but she was still thinking about the message from Patty.

“You okay?”  He asked, taking off his jacket and putting it in the closet.

“Yeah, just a weird warning from a friend.  Super vague, but that’s her way.”

He frowned at that answer, noticing the slight frown line in between her eyebrows, the one that only appeared when something was up, and the pillow she was gripping tightly in her lap.

“How was the meeting?”  She asked, an abrupt change in subject.

He shrugged, with the hint of a grin on his face.  “Sam brought Natasha fake flowers and I haven’t’ seen her so happy in a while.  Something about ‘these can’t die?’”

Darcy snickered.  “The man finally wised up.  Took him long enough.”

Bucky smiled, “Yeah, he’s learned.  And Stark brought Pepper Potts.”  The tone made it clear that he was still trying to goad Darcy into joining them.

“And I’m sure that as acting CEO of Stark Industries, she had a number of technical and relevant points to add to the conversation.”  Her eyes bored into his.

“Jane says hi.”

“I’ll see her tomorrow.”

He sighed, and gave in.  There was always next week.  “They’ve asked if I’ll join one of the team training programs.  Gonna be on Tuesday.”

Darcy thought the schedule she kept in her head.  Between their still regular meeting times on Wednesday and Friday, team meetings on Sunday and now team training on Tuesday Bucky was going to become a very busy man. 

“Still want to keep meeting on Wednesday and Friday.” 

The “Of Course, doll,” that came back was said in a way to make it clear how absurd the question was.  He leaned in to kiss her to take away any of the sting. 

She hummed happily and kissed him back, before pulling him on top of her on his surprisingly comfortable couch.  It had already been christened but it wasn’t like they couldn’t christen it again.

Enjoying the weight of him against her she pulled back slightly.  “You remember the new house rule.”

He rolled his eyes, but happily complied by removing first his own shirt and then helping her with her own.  Greedily, she ran her hands over his shoulders before wrapping both arms around his neck to pull him even closer. 


	27. Blip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Long Weekend! Here's a reminder, all relationships have their ups and downs. 
> 
> Let me know what you think!

That Monday, Darcy showed up at the gym in her normal clothes, the kind that should have been thrown out but were too comfortable too, so now it’s gym-wear.  Only, instead of just Steve and Natasha, Bucky was also there, wrapping his hands in preparation. 

“So is our co-dependency just taking on a new level?”  Darcy asked with only mild sarcasm.  On the one hand, getting to see Bucky do some hand-to-hand combat was going to be exceptionally hot.  Watching the man move on the dance floor was enough to get her going, watching the way that he would conduct himself in a situation where he wasn’t holding back?  It was going to be amazing.

But this was still one of the only things in her life that she hadn’t adapted to fit his needs, even if it had started for him anyway.  Game nights had expanded to fit everyone (which was a reminder that she needed to plan another one now that Thor was back on the planet – everyone needed to see the way he played, it was truly epic).  And most of their nights were dedicated to making sure that he would understand pop culture references or feel more comfortable going out into the normal world. 

She really liked him, that was as much as she would admit to herself, but she had no interest in being one of the people who lost themselves in a relationship.  Fake as the relationship may be. 

“I thought if I was going to start training with all the Avengers I should probably start on a small scale.  I think I’m mostly observing this week.”  Bucky said, not seeming to notice Darcy’s turmoil. 

Natasha however, as Natasha does, was watching Darcy with eagle eyes.  Maybe it was the fidgeting, or the lack of sarcasm, or the lack of a snippy response to Bucky wanting to ‘work his way up.’ 

“Ah, Okay.”  They paired off, the boys going over to a different mat to start working on things.  Meanwhile, Natasha put Darcy on a treadmill facing the guys and pointedly didn’t say anything.  Some of that was a tactic to make Darcy break, but the other part was due to the fact that both men had fairly advance hearing and while Natasha could be blunt, she wasn’t in the habit of spilling secrets when there was nothing to be gained. 

For the first time ever Darcy ran for a few miles straight without complaining.  It was easy to see why.  Steve and Bucky were sparring, but the fluid motion didn’t look like anything that happened when Darcy was in the ring.

The two men had known each other for so long and even 70 years in the ice and decades of brainwashing couldn’t remove that particular kind of familiarity.  They knew each other tells, and when one would swipe left the other could dodge fairly easily.  It was a sight to behold.

When the run ended, Darcy was a bit relieved.  Not that she was particularly tired, she just needed a change in scenery.  “You know I’m going to be taking you to lunch tomorrow.”

“If you make it that Indian Buffet that Jane and I like so much I might even tell you everything.”

“As if you’ve ever told me everything.”  Natasha huffed, pulling Darcy’s arm slightly so that she was stretching at a better angle. 

“I’ve told you enough, haven’t I?”  Darcy snarked. 

“I guess we’ll see.”  Natasha changed position and glanced behind them.  “Pay attention to Steve, Barnes.”

Darcy looked back at the men to see that Bucky was very conspicuously looking at the wall.  Exasperated, she rolled her eyes and went back to stretching. 

Finally, Natasha and Darcy got into the ring.  They were practicing falls again, though not just the falls but everything leading up to them.  When Darcy had first learned how to fall properly (and when they had first talked to her about it she thought it was a joke, you just fell, there was no right or wrong way to do it) she had ended up pretty bruised.  Falling down wrong meant there was a lot of weight distributed in a smaller area: her wrists, butt, and elbows had all been pretty unhappy with her.

The point of the whole exercise was to make sure that if she was in a fighting situation, the muscle memory would kick in and she wouldn’t hurt herself while trying to get away.

It wasn’t that she was good at falling, she was just happy to be doing something that took up all of her focus.  She had to pay attention to Natasha’s arms and legs, had to look out for the obvious moves and the not so obvious moves. 

It was a subject that made it easy to ignore everything else.  Because everything else was someone she was trying desperately not to get too angry with.  Someone who had the hair on the back of her neck standing on edge because they wouldn’t stop looking. 

It was a good thing that she was already allowed to hit things because she so desperately wanted to.  Even if Natasha was good at dodging and barely let Darcy get a hit in, it was something. 

By the end of the evening, Steve had picked up on the weird tone, and happily offered to escort Natasha back to the Tower as a way to get away from Darcy and Bucky.  Natasha waved and reminded Darcy, “Noon tomorrow, I’ll pick you up.”

Darcy nodded and waved goodbye before stonily stalking out of the building.

Just on her heels was Bucky.  “What’s wrong?”

She breathed in, how should she explain this.  “Why didn’t you tell me you were going to come tonight?”

“Well, I figured I could just join in the rotation, make sure that you’re getting a proper fighting education.”

“Because Steve and Natasha aren’t enough to teach me?”

He noticed the irritated tone in her voice.  “I didn’t say that.”  He said bluntly.

“It feels kind of like you don’t think I’m capable of taking care of myself.”

“I didn’t say that either.  Why is this bothering you so much?”

He was still trailing behind her, though a little too close for comfort and, she couldn’t hold it in anymore.  “Bucky I have adapted so much of my life to fit you.  Why couldn’t you let me have this one thing to myself?”  Even if the classes had started up as part of the contract, to make sure that Darcy wouldn’t be completely at the Winter Soldier’s mercy, it didn’t change the fact that they had become a comfort. 

Like her Sunday night chatroom escapades, it was something she could rely on, where she had a chance to catch up with friends she might not see otherwise.  And she was so busy with other things, it was nice to have an activity where she wouldn’t have to make up excuses, or act as a guide.  She finally got to learn…

“Whoa, I wasn’t trying to take over anything.  I wanted to have an easy lead up to team training, and…” his words stuttered to a halt.

Darcy had spent so much time trying not to push, and in that moment, she couldn’t hold off anymore.  “Yeah, like you haven’t been training with Steve for months.  That’s bullshit Bucky and you know it.”

“I came because you were scared last night.”  Their voices had slowly risen and while they weren’t quite yelling, it was obvious that they were in the middle of a fight.  A couple very clearly kept their distance while walking in the opposite direction, and a small part of Darcy wanted to laugh about the fact that she and Bucky were now the crazy people in NYC. 

“First off, I think jumpy would be a better term.”

“You didn’t see your face when I came home.” He muttered.

She didn’t stop and kept talking over him.  “Second, yeah, okay the message from Patty freaked me out a bit.  But that’s because I’m not used to this kind of shit.  I’m just some foster kid from the middle of nowhere who happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time on a ton of occasions.”

“I haven’t seen you like that before.”  He was suddenly quiet, like the admission hurt him.

“Even if I was scared, I have two superheroes coaching me on how not to be useless.  Having you watch them over my shoulder doesn’t exactly build up my confidence.”

“I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“Well, you’ve done that.”  They fell into silence for the last couple of blocks back to Darcy’s apartment.  Even if they were fighting, Bucky was a true gentleman and wanted to make sure she got home okay.  At the door to her building she nodded at him.  They were at the awkward moment after a fight where neither person is quite ready to see the other person’s side. 

Darcy had heard the wisdom, never go to sleep angry, but she also knew that she was the kind of person who liked to stew a little bit.  To allow the emotions rise up and overwhelm your body so that you pull yourself into a little ball, or try to take up as much space as possible just to work everything out.  And that was a process best done alone.  “I’ll see you Wednesday.”  She bit out.

He nodded at that, not wanting to break the silence.  Darcy leaned forward and gave him a light kiss.  She might still need time to decompress, but she didn’t want to completely take her frustrations out on Bucky.  He didn’t deserve that.

 

The next day at work was interesting.  Apparently, the decompressing the night before hadn’t been quite enough because it was clear she was sending off some major, “Don’t fuck with me” vibes, and people paid attention to that.  SI probably appreciated her anger.  Without people interrupting her, she managed to get through more code than usual. 

There was a quick meeting with robotics, and it was quick partly because Darcy’s normally cheery and sarcastic demeanor had become a little more brittle and even the engineers didn’t want to deal with that.

Jarvis even kept quiet, a fact that actually made Darcy a little bit sad.  His running commentary did make everything so much better.

At noon, almost on the dot, Darcy was notified that she had a guest waiting for her in the lobby.  It wasn’t like Natasha didn’t have clearance to go and visit Darcy, or that lacking clearance would stop her, but she did like to have someone call up and announce her.  It was a harmless habit and frankly saved them both a bit of time, in that they wouldn’t have to circumvent chatty Brad.

Once they had been seated, Darcy fixed the biggest plate of Indian food that she could and dug in.  Sitting across the table from her was Natasha, who had her hands pleasantly folded on the table in front of her plate of untouched food.

Unfortunately for Natasha, Darcy had spent enough time with the other woman to no longer be terrified of Natasha’s silence, especially not when there was delicious food in front of her.  She grabbed another piece of naan (her second out of the five pieces offered) before Natasha finally gave in and started eating. 

Had it been anyone else, Darcy was sure that Natasha would have waited them out.  But she knew Darcy, and knew that Darcy would eat all of the naan before she would break.

However, once she had started eating, all it took was a simple question for the floodgates to open.  “So, what’s going on?”

“Do you want the short version or the long version?”  Darcy asked with a grimace.

Natasha raised an eyebrow, like that was even a question.  She was shelling out for the good Indian buffet.  Of course she wanted the long version.

“Okay, this is a secret.  You can’t tell any of your buds, especially not Sam.  He’s such a gossip.”  Natasha waved her hand, telling Darcy to get a move on it.  “Okay.”  Darcy breathed in deeply.

She went on to explain the whole situation.  How they had begun sleeping together, but weren’t dating.  That addition got a crinkling of Natasha’s forehead, and she leaned a little farther in.  When Darcy talked about the fact that she maybe, just a little, was developing feelings for Bucky, Natasha sat back in the comfortable booth. 

It did end up being a pretty long story and Darcy was disappointed to find that her food had gotten a little cool from all the time she had spent talking.  But cold Indian food was still good Indian food, so she continued to eat while Natasha processed everything she had heard.

“Are you sure that he knows it’s just physical?”

Darcy snorted into her butter chicken, “What else could it be?  He’s still recovering.  Me being in a real relationship with him would be taking advantage of the fact that I’m basically a therapist. This way I’m more of a sex surrogate until he finds someone who matches him better than I do.”

Natasha snorted, ruining Darcy’s moment of introspection and self-pity. 

“What?”  She glared at the redhead. 

“It’s not my job to fix you.”

Darcy’s head jerked back a little, “And I didn’t ask you to.”  She knew what her faults were and didn’t expect anybody to ‘fix’ her, that was her own fucking job whether or not she did a good job.

That answer seemed to surprise Natasha, although it shouldn’t have considering how independent she had been until that point.  “So what are you going to do?”

Darcy shrugged, “What any hot-blooded American woman would do.  Bite the bullet, swallow my feelings and fuck Bucky’s brains out for the good of the county.”

“I feel like you’re exaggerating slightly here.”

Darcy fought the urge to shrug again, “hey, maybe I can fuck the nerves out of his system, get him back to fighting order.”

“Pretty sure if that happens, it won’t have been because of some epic fucking.”

“And yet, I’m not going to let your negative energy get me down.”  Darcy took a calm sip of her drink and raised an eyebrow.

“Just Bucky…” 

Darcy snorted into her drink.  Natasha waited until she had dabbed some of the liquid off of her face before asking, “So what are you going to do now that he’s joined your self-defense lessons?”

“We talked, I’m not sure he’s going to come again.  Frankly, I’m not sure he’s going to want to see me again.”

“One fight isn’t going to change anything.”

Darcy sighed heavily.  Natasha was probably right, it was their first fight and she had forgiven people for worse.  If they couldn’t get over this one fight there was no way their friendship was going to last.  Darcy did have a tendency of putting people on their toes and then pissing them off.  Perfect example, Tony Stark. 

“I’ll take your word for it.  Now,”  trying to change the subject, “you mentioned a new hold last night.  What should I expect next Monday if you try to teach it to me?”

It was an obvious segue and they both knew it, but there had been enough serious talk, and a little bit of gossip about fighting techniques between women could go far.  So Natasha acquiesced and they talked about literally everything else.

That night was training with the Avengers.  Darcy spent a good portion of the night pretending that she wasn’t nervous for Bucky.  Even going so far as to utilize the itty-bitty kitchen in her apartment to try and fix some real food.

There was no way that she was going to hang out in Bucky’s apartment while she waited.  The image that would come from that would be a woman who so needed to be forgiven that she was willing to overlook and overstep in boundaries and Darcy wasn’t willing to be the woman who would give in so easily.

So, she was miserable in her own apartment, knowing that she wouldn’t hear about what happened until later.

Later ended up being a text that Natasha sent at about 9:30 pm.  ‘All going well, he’s definitely going to forgive you.’ 

Darcy couldn’t be sure what prompted that message.  There was a picture in her head that Bucky was a little more brutal than normal in his anger, or that he was brooding more than usual.  For all her daydreams, she still hoped that it wouldn’t be an activity that screwed up his chances of getting out there to fight.  While she was scared for that possibility, she knew that he needed that in his future.  He didn’t deal well with silence, and while she had done a good job of filling his life with a little more noise, having something else to fill his time could only be a good thing.

And he was so hopeful.  It was hidden under a few layers of distrust and worry, but it didn’t change the fact that he so clearly wanted to be part of the group to do some good.  Whether it was the comradery, or the urge to do some good to make up for his years being brainwashed, he was desperate to be a part of it.

Regardless of how the text was meant, Darcy took it to be a good thing.  That good thing calmed her nerves enough that she allowed herself to throw away the burnt and crappy remains of the pasta sauce she was trying to fix, and order Chinese food.  She had earned something on the unhealthy scale.

 

That Wednesday was a quiet affair.  Darcy had finished another long day at work, and Bucky was clearly tired from his workout with the Avengers, and yet neither of them seemed willing to talk about anything that mattered.  Bucky said nothing about the training, and Darcy didn’t try to start up a conversation the way that she normally did.  They bypassed dinner and Darcy immediately put a movie on.  It wasn’t a classic, far from it.  Really it was more along the lines of spacejam than it was James Bond.  He might still be a little bit out of date, but Anchorman seemed like a decent option, even if Bucky wouldn’t get all of the references. 

Darcy didn’t enjoy the movie as much as she normally did, due to the stony silence that was still pervasive.  And yet, she wasn't willing to give in on this.  As an adult, she was allowed to have some level or privacy and that wasn’t going to change just because someone was being an overprotective asshole.

The thing that made it hard was the fact that she understood why he was so worried.  They lived in a dangerous world, and being friends with superheroes could make her a target.  Yet, working out with two superheroes didn’t make it an unsafe decision. She couldn’t have been better protected. 

When the movie ended, she collected her belongings in near silence.  At the door she said over her shoulder, “Just so you know, I’m not going to change my mind of this.  I need to have something of my own.  I like spending time with you, but we need to have boundaries.”

“I know.”  He said, and that was all.

They repaired everything even more as they sent text messages back and forth for the next two days.  When one would arrive at work, Darcy would read it and then relay the message to Jarvis so that she could get some advice from an overly intelligent AI. 

Luckily, she had gotten past the point of being terrified; it seemed like he (because Jarvis had become a he in Darcy’s mind) had fairly strict definitions of what was right and wrong.  In fact, she had even dealt with a short period of being shut out by the AI after she had cursed out Tony Stark.  A fact that meant that the AI had an even further reach than she had realized before.  It took a quick explanation of Darcy’s actions (which she never thought she would have to give to a computer) before he had warmed up slightly, and given her another playlist to start working through. 

Funnily enough, the AI seemed to have pretty decent advice.  To be fair, she was starting to believe that Jarvis had full and uninterrupted access to the internet which would mean he had a number of databases to pull experiences from and therefore figure out a good way to react.

She wouldn’t tell Jarvis, but she normally sent her responses to Bucky before asking Jarvis for advice.  As interesting as it was to see what the ‘right’ answer would be in the situation, Darcy didn’t want to be disingenuous. 

Which is why after and apology and promise that he wouldn’t do it again, Darcy quickly added in a sandlot quote and then changed the subject.  There was no point in dwelling on something painful and pointless.  There were so many bigger things to worry about (example: the unrest in Asgard – cut the shit, Thor was clearly quieter than normal and that didn’t bode well for the news coming out of Asgard). 

Besides, he made her happy.  And even if he had done something a little bit boneheaded in the short term (even though she had never made it clear that her self-defense class needed to be a solo activity), if he followed through with his decision to leave some of her time to herself, it proved that he respected her boundaries.  Boundaries that she probably should have set up a long time ago to make sure that something like this didn’t happen in the first place.

She sighed, but it was what it was.  It wasn’t like she could go back and time in fix things.  Though if she wanted to she probably knew all of the people capable of making that happen.  Jane was already working on a portal, and adding Tony Stark in the mix.  She shook her head to change her thought process.  Jane was smart enough to not want to mess with time travel and Tony Stark didn’t like her enough to help with a project that stupid and time consuming. 


	28. If you're with Thor, it's a good idea to find somewhere that's all-you-can-eat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To give you an idea of how long ago I wrote this chapter, Neil Degrasse Tyson was mentioned, which I felt I needed to remove after the various allegations...  
> Oh well, here is your chapter, as always it's just a little bit later than promised. But it's here none-the-less. I hope you enjoy game night.
> 
> Let me know what you think!

Time went on; she dragged Bucky, Steve, Natasha, and Sam off to see a show on Broadway.  All that was required was seats fairly far back in the theater, on the aisle and near an exit point.  Oh, and funding from Tony Stark.  That man did not like Darcy, but he was ridiculously generous with everyone else.  And considering it was her idea…. He might have paid for everything but he didn’t bother showing up.  A fact that had Steve frowning until the opening song broke. 

She and Bucky went swing dancing again.  Finally the horde of girls who followed him around got the hint that he wasn’t interested.  To be fair, it took a fairly deep and desperate kiss for them to get the hint.  And then, having broken the unspoken rule about kissing in public, Bucky took the opportunity to ravish her whenever the music allowed it. 

That night ended up being quite a lot of fun for both of them. 

They still watched their movies and ate dinner together.  Darcy had started making Bucky cook with more regularity.  It hadn’t taken much to convince him, something that confused Darcy.

When she asked why he gave in he shrugged, “It’s healthier, costs less, and I get to show off for you.” 

Darcy smiled at how cheesy he could be and tried to help him.  By helping, she really meant that she would steal bits of the vegetables that he was chopping up, or sneak the chocolate they both knew was hidden specifically for her in one of the lower cabinets, or break into the bottle of wine he pulled out for the two of them.  Generally, she was a bit of a terror when she offered to help.

And true to his word, Bucky didn’t try to drop in on her training sessions any more.  When she talked to Natasha about it, the other woman said, “He’s been coming in in the early afternoon.  Fights with Steve for a while.” 

“Perfect.”  Darcy sighed, leaning back on the mats before Natasha smacked at her and pushed her to do her stretches the right way. 

On one of the days where Jane got too caught up in a project to leave the lab (this time it was a legitimate complaint; she had to look at a few stars, and given the planets rotations, there was a fairly small time window where it would be possible) Darcy invited Thor out to dinner.

Finding an all-you-can-eat buffet was always a good idea when Thor was involved.  Same as finding places with decent drink specials.

Lucky enough, New York has a plethora of both if you know where to look.  And as a recent college graduate (okay, it’d been more than two years but until Darcy felt like she was ready to take on the mantle of ‘actual adult’ she was going to call herself a recent college graduate), Darcy knew where to look.

It was good to finally see the god outside of other functions.  There were lines around his eyes that hadn’t been there last time she saw him, and a heaviness to his gaze that seemed new.  Every other time she had seen him he was cuddling with Jane, or telling someone about one of his epic adventures.  Sometimes, when the story had ended, she would see him staring at the New York Skyline.  The skyline was a nice view, but it didn’t necessarily explain the melancholy look he seemed to sport when no one was looking.

Once they had fixed their first plate of food, of which there would be many, they started to talk.   Darcy may have been a person to barge into a lot of conversations, but this was something that probably shouldn’t be rushed.  Nobody liked the Spanish Inquisition.

It took a while before the conversation took a turn. 

“Loki is dead.” 

Darcy breathed in sharply.  She hadn’t been in New York for that disaster, but she had been in New Mexico when Loki had decided that leveling a town would be worth it if Thor perished. 

Never having had siblings of her own, Darcy didn’t necessarily understand Thor’s connection to his brother.  Especially when said brother had tried to murder a number of people on a number of occasions.  And, while Thor had plenty of epics that he told, he rarely talked about his brother.  If Loki was mentioned, he was a minor part in those stories. 

“Are you okay?”  Darcy asked, knowing the question was never going to be enough.  Losing someone made everything harder, and Darcy had known that Frigga was dead.  Two deaths was more than enough to knock anyone off balance, even someone as positive as Thor.

He thought for a second and slowly nodded, the pause wouldn’t have fit him the first time she met him but seemed to suit him now.  “It hasn’t been easy but I have been able to spend time with my dearest Jane and my Shield brethren.  That has been healing.”

Darcy put her hand on his arm.  “If you need anything just let me know.”

He smiled, “I would not hesitate to talk to you, my lightning sister.”

She laughed, “Did I tell you what happened the first time most of them found out that I tazed you?”

Darcy went into the story, laughing about Bucky being worried on her behalf even years after the initial incident. 

Thor smiled through the entire thing.  It was a point of pride for him the way she had managed to take him down.  Not that it hadn’t hurt, getting hit with a bolt of controlled lightning wasn’t exactly fun, but there was still some level of comfort knowing that Darcy would be able to protect herself and her friends.

At the end of the story he smiled widely.  “I’m so glad you’ve found a boon companion in the good Captain’s friend.”

Darcy read between the lines and smiled uncomfortably.  It made sense to let everyone think that she and Bucky were dating.  Trying to explain to Thor about the contract and eventual friends with benefits situation would be incredibly strange, considering she wasn’t positive he understood what “Friend with Benefits” really meant. 

And then she would have to get into the whole conversation about how, while she was clearly emotionally and physically into Bucky, she wasn’t willing to get into a real relationship.  Given the way Thor was one of her biggest cheerleaders it would be a fight she couldn’t win.  Something would come out eventually.

So, she smiled, “He’s pretty great.”

He smiled, “You and your companion and the Lady Jane and I should go on a,” he paused, “twice date?”

“Double date.”  Darcy smiled again, though it was tinged with a little more pain than the previous one.  Jane knew the situation and would be dropping hints to Thor, even though Darcy had asked her not to. 

To change the subject, Darcy blurted out.  “You know, Jane really missed you,” It almost wasn’t worth it for the way his shoulders drooped, but she pushed on, “can I help you find a way to make it up to her?”

He perked up again at that.  “That’s a wondrous idea!”  Pulling a phone from his pocket, he unlocked it and started to type something into it.   The image of Thor holding onto a phone was incredibly anachronistic.  He had learned how to wear ‘relatively’ normal clothing while in ‘Midgard,’ but that didn’t mean it was his preferred way of dressing or that he didn’t still stick out like a sore thumb. 

The phone made sense once Darcy thought about it.  It was probably Avengers issued, for when he was going to spend any amount of time on planet.  It wouldn’t be particularly helpful for him to be on-planet if no one could fine him if he took a fancy date with Jane.

Still, his hands dwarfed the phone and a quick glance showed it was one of the newer models.  Jane had talked about the fact that technology in Asgard was miles ahead of what was currently possible on Earth.  That fact alone explained how his fingers managed to deftly weave over the screen.  If he could manipulate 3-D holograms, a touch screen probably seemed easy.

For a split second Darcy wished that she could have gone to Asgard, but considering the conditions under which Jane visited, it was probably for the best that she hadn’t.  Plus, she may have had very subtle plans to get wasted with Sif and reign a little bit of destruction over the city. 

Darcy ignored how strange it was to see him with the phone and started to brainstorm.  “Well you could always take her out of the city and look at the stars, though that does have a high probability that the stars will take precedence and she’ll get distracted.”

“Jane is at her most beautiful when her passions show.”  Thor seemed lost in thought.  But the idea was so sweet that Darcy almost wanted to gag.

“There’s always the zoo.  Jane never could say no to seeing penguins and meerkats.

“Would she enjoy some of the animals on my world as well?”

Darcy grimaced, “Aren’t most of them like 8 feet tall and poisonous.  Asgard is pretty much Australia where the wildlife is concerned.”

He frowned, “I’m not aware of this Australia, however you make a prescient point.  The animals on Asgard are larger than many I’ve seen on this planet.”

“Oooh, you know, I think,” Darcy grabbed the phone out of Thor’s hands and minimized the screen where ‘date ideas’ had been typed into google (pfft, amateur) and furiously added a few words.  After loading she handed the phone back, “Bill Nye is giving a talk and while Jane is definitely smarter than this guy she’s in awe of people who can take science and make it accessible.  If you can get tickets, you’d make her week.”

Thor took his phone back and looked at the site she had pulled up.  “Thank you very much for your help, Darcy.  I am in your debt.”

Darcy winked and gave awkward finger guns, “Just let me know the next time Sif comes for a visit.  I’m looking forward to getting some quality time in with another badass lady warrior.”

Lunch continued and they both got a few more plates of food, though Thor greatly out-ate Darcy.  Once they were both full, or in Thor’s case, full enough, they walked back to the tower so that Darcy could help Thor drag her away from her project, and say goodbye. 

Jane was still hunched over one of the machines she was trying to upgrade with a screwdriver clenched between her teeth and a roll of duct tape in between her feet.  Becca was flitting around trying to find something that Jane was looking for.  One look at the situation and Darcy rolled her eyes, “try looking under stacks of paper.  Jane layers things constantly.” 

Jane’s head popped up, seeing both Darcy and Thor she checked the clock.  “It’s that time already?”

“Yes, my love.  I’ve come to escort you home.”  Thor extended his arm gallantly, and Jane looked bemused but happily took the proffered arm.  Boy were things different with Thor around.  There were still late nights taken up completely by science, but she was also a little more willing to leave when the most important work had been done. 

Darcy walked with them to the elevator.  “Oh, I forgot to ask.  Game night sometime next week?  I told Bucky he needed a chance to play with the dream team.”

A competitive gleam shone out from both their eyes.  “Oooh, they haven’t learned what getting properly smashed is like.”

“I promise I will prove my strength and endurance to you my dear Jane.”

“I feel like you’ve already proven your endurance there, big guy.”  Darcy muttered.  She had lived in the apartment with them after London.  Even if Thor had only been able to stick around for a short time, Darcy had learned a few more things about their relationship than she had really wanted to know.

Jane blushed and Thor tried to hide a chuckle before picking Jane up and carrying her into the elevator.  He gave Darcy a salacious wink, which thankfully Jane didn’t see, as the elevator doors closed.  In any other scenario, Darcy would have said his new teammates were rubbing off on him, but she had met the warriors three and lady Sif.  In all likelihood this was just the way he acted when there was nothing pressing on him. 

 

Game night finally arrived.  Darcy had worked with Steve to make sure that anyone who was interested could make it.  And there was a big group.  Apparently, all the boasting that Darcy had done had drummed up a decent amount of interest.  At least enough interest for a few people to invite a few other people.  Enough people that teams had to be made and the game night couldn’t be hosted in Bucky’s apartment.

Instead, they went to Tony Stark’s tower and set up the games in the living room.

Given the invitation seemed to have been passed around through the entirety of the Avengers as well as among some personal friends (mostly Tony’s, lets be honest, nobody on the team was particularly good at making friends) there was definitely going to be a bigger crowd.  Luckily, Thor had been tasked with bringing Asgardian mead which would surely knock Bucky and Steve flat, and Tony Stark had offered to provide the rest of the booze and snacks.  Considering he was a billionaire, and could find out what he paid Darcy which was more than she had ever made before but not enough to keep the Avengers fed even for a single night while still paying her rent, it was only fair.

And Darcy had even been organized enough to find a few designated drinkers.  People who could drink a little, but would ultimately be in charge of making sure that nothing got too out of hand.  AKA, the hulk wouldn’t make an appearance, and that they’d be able to control Bucky if the Winter Soldier part of his personality made and appearance and took a dislike to anyone in the room.  The night’s lucky winners were Bruce, for obvious reasons, Rhodey, also for obvious reasons, and Natasha because her Russian heritage meant she was never actually drunk.  At least that’s what she claimed, Darcy had seen a few occasions that would argue to the contrary.  Yet, no smart woman ever disagreed with the Black Widow on something that was a point of pride.

That way held only pain and contempt.  The contempt mostly coming from the people smart enough to hear her say that and recognize that intelligence sometimes requires a lie.

With the number of people showing up, they easily broke off into teams.  Bucky and Darcy, Sam and Natasha, Jane and Thor, Steve and Tony, Rhodey and Pepper, and Bruce played by himself because they were short a person and Tony liked to joke that Bruce didn’t want anyone to drag down his intelligence. 

That comment made the man stutter slightly and then sigh and shake his head.  There was no point in arguing with Tony Stark, much less over a joke that everyone recognized as a joke.  Would have been a waste of time.

And so the game started.  And it started vicious.  The first game chosen was Settlers of Cattan, one of Thor’s personal favorites.  It was clear from the beginning that everyone had chosen a different strategy; building the longest road, amassing a huge army, taking over all of the ports so the majority of trading has to go through one team, you know, fun stuff. 

It was bloodthirsty and fun.  It was the first time Steve had ever gotten truly drunk.  Darcy expected it was reminiscent of when he had first been transformed.  He would reach out and knock over whatever he was reaching for, he broke more than one glass, and may have been a little bit too forceful in his celebrations with Tony whenever they got to pass out drinks. 

Pepper and Rhodey would roll their eyes at Steve’s antics and Tony’s obvious amusement and goading on of the situation while quietly dominating the board and passing out drinks, though they did mostly hand out drinks to Tony and Steve.  Clearly they were enjoying something about the dynamic. 

Jane and Thor ended up being the come from behind victors.  Thor would boast about a move, a move that would seem plausible, yet when their turn came Jane would move different pieces, and as everyone got drunker, nobody seemed to pick up on that strategy other than the three mostly sober people in the room. 

At the end of the first game, Bruce tapped out.  He would be available if they needed some help, but didn’t want to aggravate his own ‘personality quirks’ and was close to reaching his limit. 

When Darcy finished setting up the board for round two, she leaned back into the couch, where Bucky laid his arm over her shoulder.  The move felt so natural, like that was the way it should always be.  If they had been at Bucky's apartment she happily would have cuddled up against his side.  But too many people in this room knew the complete truth, or knew so little of what was happening that she didn't want to give them the wrong picture. As much as she wished she could do what felt natural, instead she shimmied, knocking his arm back with her shoulder. 

He, like Steve, was getting kind of drunk.  Not the fall down drunk that Steve was nearing, but there was a blurriness around his eyes and looseness to his limbs that pointed to the fact that he had had more to drink than he was used to.  To be fair, the amount he was used to drinking was nothing.

But he frowned at her move, and instead tried to grab her hand.  A move that Darcy, yet again, pulled away from.  “Trouble in paradise?”  Tony leered from across the board.

Darcy looked at Tony, and then glanced at Steve and raised her eyebrows back at Tony.  “Do you want to open that can of worms?”

He thought for a second, tilted his head, and lifted his glass to her.  It had been a quiet exchange and the only ones to pick up on it were Natasha and Rhodey.  Being the sober person at the party sometimes had it’s benefits. 

Tony and Bucky both seemed to either forget, or decided to let it drop.

They started round two and once it was clear that their strategy of trying to do a little of everything wasn’t going to work that time around, Jane and Thor made a ‘subtle’ exit.  By subtle, Darcy meant that Thor announced it was time for him and his “Lady” to settle in for the night.  He then picked her up, which caused her to hiccup and then giggle and carried her out of the room. 

Darcy was glad she didn’t live anywhere near them that night.  There was no way it would be a pleasant night for whoever lived next to, below or above them. 

Once they’ve left, Pepper decided to turn in as well.  She hooked her fingers through her heels and smiled, standing unsteadily.  “I’ve attended enough parties with Tony Stark to know my limits.  Have fun, and keep the property damage under five figures, please?”  She shot Tony a look and he smiled deviously. 

“Sounds like a Tuesday.” 

Pepper smiled fondly, and tottered unsteadily towards the elevator.  It was an interesting fact that even after their breakup, Tony had made sure that Pepper still had living quarters in the Tower, even if they were different than before. 

Tony looked at Rhodey.  “You still up for another round?”

“You know that I’m not gonna let you beat me, right?”  Rhodey replied, knowing that considering he was DD, he could probably outlast the rest of the people still awake. 

As it was, Sam was flagging something fierce, Steve would be out of commission soon, as would Darcy.  Bucky hadn’t had enough to cause any serious damage, but the evening probably wouldn’t be too much longer anyway.

“Perfect, time for a new game.”  Tony pushed the game off of the table.

Darcy let out a quiet ‘hey, not cool.’ While Tony continued, “We’re going to play my favorite game, Truth, Dare, Strip.”

Rhodey snorted, “Ah, this gem.”

“Are you an actual child?”  Darcy blurted out.  The idea of Truth, Dare, Strip seemed ludicrous for anyone past college age.  If you want to see someone get naked, just ask.  Turning it into a game for a group of adults seemed a little bit strange. 

But the question seemed to actually knock Tony back.  Maybe it was the absurd amount of alcohol that everyone had had that night lowering inhibitions for him to show things like discomfort and disappointment to people outside of his inner circle, but even drunk Darcy knew what the right thing to do was. 

“Fine, Truth, Dare, Strip, but you’re gonna have to clean up the board game first.”

“Of course.”  Tony promised, not moving an inch to actual clean anything up.

Rhodey looked at his friend.  “You know I’m not doing that for you.”

Tony shrugged and rubbed his hands together.  “Who wants to go first?”

The night devolved quickly from there.  Rhodey made sure they stayed within Pepper’s damage control limits, but everything else was on the table.  At some point Tony was wearing only his boxers (he never had to strip, just seemed to want to show off his physique?), Steve and Darcy were both shirtless (Darcy was perfectly fine showing off her cute bra), Sam wasn’t wearing pants, and Natasha still looked absolutely perfect.  Bucky hadn’t lost anything either because he had no fear when it came to the dares (not much of a point asking him a truth – so many of the things he could remember had depressing answers).

“We are never talking about this again.”  Sam said strongly.  He had gotten a number of dares that he had blushed his way through, much to Natasha’s amusement, but apparently didn’t want spread around.

With good reason. This was clearly not Tony’s first rodeo, and his genius extended beyond being an engineer and a ‘futurist.’ 

“You still need to pick up Settlers of Catan for me.”  She pointed two fingers at her eyes and then back at him, the universal symbol for ‘I’m watching you.’ 

“It’ll be done by morning.”  He smiled lazily, watching as the still shirtless and intoxicated Steve tried to straighten up the room. 

“Don’t let Steve do it, he’ll bend the cards.” She whined. 

Bucky rolled his eyes, grabbed her hand and tried to drag her out of the room before she continued to pout grumpily at her boss.  No good could come of leaving the two of them in a room mostly by themselves. Darcy might do something that would actually get her fired. 

Darcy let Bucky pull her all the way to the room he kept in the Tower.  It was one of Tony Stark’s crusades.  And in this case, Tony Stark crusade meant Steve Rogers bludgeoning Tony Stark in order to get Bucky a room.  Anyone on the team had a place to crash, it was designed originally for after missions, yet most of the team had taken everything a little more seriously. 

Bucky’s rooms were sparsely decorated in the same way his apartment had been at the beginning.  Yet Darcy didn’t feel the same need to decorate these rooms.  After all, they were only a stopgap, a place to rest a head until enough energy had been recovered to make it home.

As soon as they were inside with the door shut Darcy let herself fall against Bucky, reaching up to pull his head down so she could ravish him.  His hands immediately went to her hips and Darcy leaned her full weight against him.  It was messier than normal, but they had both had more to drink than normal. 

Darcy was trying to figure out if there was a way to get them both over to the bed without stopping the kissing and had come to the sad realization that it probably wasn’t possible in their current states when Bucky pulled back, breathing roughly against her neck. 

“Why didn’t you want me to hold your hand tonight?”

Darcy let her harsh breathing cover up the fact that she needed a moment to come up with an excuse.  “I don’t know, it felt like weird PDA in front of our friend.”  She managed, barely, to have that not come out as a question. She made an obvious move and grabbed his hand to pull him to the bed, might as well take the break with the awkward question and use it to her advantage.

“Yes, so much worse that making out in front of a bunch of strangers at swing dancing.”  He asked as his kissed his way down her neck.  He seemed to drop it after that as there were obviously more important things to attend to.  Darcy should have known it was too easy. 


	29. If wishes were horses...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, sorry for how delayed this is. I just started a new job and it's been a bit chaotic plus I've been a little more social over the last few weeks from normal so I've had some trouble arranging my free time.
> 
> Also, this is a short one. I realized I need to rewrite a portion of this story, and we are about at the point where I need to be revising, so unfortunately I don't think I'm going to be able to keep to the weekly update schedule anymore. Trust me, I'm still working on this, it's far from abandoned.

For the next week, it seemed like Bucky was trying to ease her into some light public displays of affection.  He kissed her on the cheek after they grabbed lunch one day.  He tried to hold her hand at a concert they went to. 

One day he even cooked her lunch and brought it to the office.  Jill had walked in telling her she had a visitor and there in the doorway was Bucky in a hoodie with a plastic bag full of Tupperware.  His smile was crooked, and lit up his face.  Darcy couldn’t help but to melt, even though she could feel the eyes of the entire department on her. 

“Hey there, got a few minutes free?”  Darcy could almost see Jill swoon. 

The words that immediately came to mind were, ‘for you, always,’ but that didn’t really fit what she was trying to do.  “Might have a few.”  She fought the urge to smile back and grabbed his arm to finally end the scene they were making. 

Walking out of the office she could see Alba’s disapproving face.  A quick wave was all she had time for, knowing she was going to need to talk to her supervisor later.

Lunch ended up being a huge treat.  Darcy was a sucker for lasagna and Bucky knew it, so there was lasagna and fresh salad, and it was absolutely perfect.  Bucky left his left hand just laying on the table, an offer that Darcy could take up whenever she wanted.  And oh did she want to. 

The entire situation was so sweet, and all she wanted to do was grab his hand and be that ridiculously schmoopy couple that everyone pretended to gag at but secretly wanted to be.  Basically, Darcy wanted what she had made fun of Jane and Thor for for months, except without the boyfriend leaving for months at a time. 

Yet she held herself back.  Everything was getting more complicated than she had wanted, and Bucky being sweet wasn’t helping the fact that she was starting to want more and more.  The only answer she could see was to become more and more distant, except that there was no way that would help him adjust to the modern world.

She thanked him for lunch patting his hand and then tried to leave so that he wouldn’t walk her back to her office.

Getting back to her desk ended up being a bit of a struggle.  Before even Alba could call her into the office, Jill accosted her.

“Is that your boyfriend?”

Darcy waved her off, “nope, just a friend.”

“I wish my friends brought me homemade lunches.”  Jill’s tone said clearly that she didn’t think Bucky was ‘just a friend.’  It was tempted to argue, except it was one of the cases where she could imagine someone saying ‘the lady doth protest too much,’ like a pretentious douchebag.  Though she did kind of appreciate the sentiment.

Instead she shrugged and said, “Maybe you need to get better friends.”

Jill frowned a bit at that, and upon reflection it wasn’t exactly the nicest thing that Darcy could say, but then Alba was waving her into her office and Darcy knew she had bigger problems to worry about.

“Close the door please.”

Darcy followed the instructions and closed the door before sitting in the chair in front of Alba. 

There were a few moments where Alba let her stew in the silence, clicking around on her computer.  Classic tactic, really.

“I don’t like drama in my office.”  Darcy nodded at the sentiment, “I don’t like gossip either.”  Darcy nodded again.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t think he would just show up…” her voice trailed off by the amused look on Alba’s face.

“You aren’t in trouble, but if those gossipy coworkers of yours start to become a problem, you need to let me know.” 

Darcy deflated, she wouldn’t have to worry about the safety of her job just because her quasi-boyfriend decided to stop by.  “Thanks, there’s just a lot…”

Alba held up her hand, “That being said, I don’t need to hear about it now.”

It was a clear dismissal and Darcy couldn’t tell if she was amused or irritated by it. 

Schooling her expression to look like she had just been disciplined was a magical way to get back to her desk.  Nobody wanted to risk Alba’s wrath, and the worst time to be a pest was right after she had taken someone down a peg, she always seemed like she was in the mood to do it again.  So, Darcy made it to her desk and plugged in her headphones, pinging Jarvis before anyone else could get in her way.

It was time to knuckle down and get to work.

 


	30. We Hold Each Other Plenty

Apparently Bucky wasn’t happy about the fact that she had started pulling her hand from his, or ducking out from underneath his arm, or avoiding kissing him in public.  Every time she did, he would get this frown, this frown that looked confused and hurt.  It was an expression that was a little too reminiscent of when they had first met; when he had seemed a little bit broken and hadn’t been willing to talk. 

Darcy did the same thing that she had when everything had first started.  She talked to cover up how awkward everything was.  At this point it seemed like a safe guess that Bucky knew pretty much every important thing about her. 

In the days leading up, Darcy could tell everything was about to come to a head.  For starters, instead of just frowning, Bucky would turn to her and ask, “Is everything okay?”

To which Darcy would answer, “Yeah, the PDA still just feels weird.”

His eyes would narrow and Darcy was sure he was thinking about every time that they had walked to the bodega while holding hands, or the time they had kissed at swing dancing to prove he was off the market.  And it probably didn’t count as a ‘public’ display of affection when the only people seeing it were their mutual friends.  She tried to brush it off and push him towards the team meetings, and whatever training he was doing. 

Changing the subject was her best bet.  He still hadn’t been cleared to do anything public with the Avengers but he was regularly attending the meetings.  Every day he seemed more sure of himself.  There was a swagger to his walk that hadn’t been there before.  At times he almost walked the way the Winter Soldier had, with the firm confidence that he could handle whatever came towards him.  Although now he had a team to back him up, as well as an urge to survive the encounters so she hoped that he wouldn’t just stand in front of a crashing car that was headed directly towards him.

Yet, he was an adult and if that was his life choice she would let him make it.  Mostly because it’s not like she could stop it from happening.

He still tried to convince her to join them for dinners, but while a game night and the occasional party all seemed okay in her mind, attending a team dinner (lets be honest, it was definitely a team bonding night.  The evening never actually ended after dinner which Darcy knew, because there was more than one night where she had tried to surprise Bucky and he didn’t make it home – it wasn’t a total loss considering his bed was sinfully comfortable and sometimes he would decide to wake her in her favorite fashion – wink wink nudge nudge) was crossing a line.  Even if she already knew most if not all of the people who attended on the regs, the only people who seemed to go were either part of the Avengers or a significant other. 

Darcy wasn’t a significant other, it was the only way she allowed herself to carry on with the charade.  At the point where that line got crossed, it would be a problem.  So, no team dinners. 

The final straw happened at a concert. 

As usual, they were sitting on an aisle and near an exit.  The music wasn’t crazy loud and the band had avoided any use of strobe lights, both of which meant Bucky was less likely to be triggered.  Leaning back in her chair, Darcy realized that Bucky’s arm was draped over the back of her seat.  She nudged at it a little bit until he gave her a look but pulled it back.

Before Darcy could sigh in relief, he grabbed her hand.  She pulled away and gave him a look, knowing that nothing she could saw would be heard over the music. 

He rolled his eyes in frustration, but let go, only to rest his hand gently just above her knee.  The gesture seemed like it was meant to be soothing, but that was the last way Darcy would have described it. 

“I’m gonna grab a snack.  Want anything?”  She yelled in his general direction, barely standing around for him to answer. 

She ducked and weaved through the crowd of people that seemed to congregate near the otherwise open doorways, and made her way to the bathroom. 

She refused to be the cliché that has a breakdown in the bathroom.  There was no splashing water on her face, there was no crying in a stall or getting some sort of wisdom from a clearly drunk but well-meaning woman.  Darcy peed, pulled her skinny jeans back on, washed her hands, adjusted the scarves she was wearing, and took a deep breath.  Everything that had happened had made it clear that Bucky wasn’t happy with the way she was trying to keep their physical relationship private.  How much longer could her obviously fake reasoning last.  It wasn’t like she had had a problem with the physical affection before.

It took a few minutes in line to grab a popcorn and a soda, and she was back in the concert hall within 15 minutes of having stepped out of it.  When Bucky glanced up, she gave him a tight smile and shoved the popcorn in his face (with the faster metabolism he needed the extra calories, and he was hungry even when he said he wasn’t) and took a sip of her Sprite. 

She sat through the rest of the concert trying to hide her anxiety.  She didn’t want to make a scene, and she was disappointed.  The band was some indie thing that she had randomly found and had been so excited to share the tickets with Bucky.  There wasn’t much modern music that seemed to excite him, he seemed to like the Sinatra’s and Van Morrison’s of the world over the Ke$ha’s or The Weeknd.  And here she was unable to actually enjoy the concert because he was knowingly or unknowingly pushing an issue that she desperately wished wasn’t an actual issue.

They were walking out the door, and threw away the mostly empty container of popcorn, when he tried to grab her hand again.  She pulled her hand away from his and gently nudged him with her shoulder, “I think we should talk about this when we get home.”  She glanced around with purpose, making sure it was clear that her hesitance was due to the large crowd as opposed to any fear of him.

The rest of the trip home was ruled by hesitancy.  Hesitancy on Bucky’s part because he wasn’t sure what kind of contact was allowed; if he could brush her hair out of her face, or tug her towards a taxi cab, if it would be okay for their legs to rub together.  Hesitancy on her part because she wasn’t sure where to draw the boundary; how to make so many tiny harmless gestures okay in private but not okay around other people, how to make sure that Bucky was protected in all the ways that she couldn’t protect herself.

They arrived back at his apartment in silence.  Darcy paid the taxi driver and they shared a very quiet elevator ride.

The first question out of Bucky’s mouth was the question that Darcy had begun to hate.

“Are you okay?”

“Of course I’m okay,” she said, hoping that all of this could just be some quick discussion, “There’s just something about physical affection in public that makes me nervous.”

“I don’t think that’s the case.  We did our fair share of ‘PDA’ to scare off the women at swing.  And even more than that I’ve seen you practically hug strangers, but now you won’t let me hold your hand.”

“That’s different.”

“How?”  They keep gravitating towards each other in the empty space between the coffee table and the television, though Darcy keeps her feet moving.  A constant pacing back and forth, the total distance about 10 feet.  Somehow, moving to the other side of the coffee table would feel defensive.

“The kissing was to make sure those women were going to stop making you uncomfortable… Everything else is just platonic, it doesn’t mean anything.”

He pauses to look at her.  And in this moment she can see how she’s hurt him.  There’s a wariness to his eyes and a hint of the hesitancy that plagued their early interactions.  He looks physically pained when he says.  “Why do I feel like you don’t want this?”  He gestured between the two of them.

Darcy stops her pacing and grabs his hands, “I do, I want this.  I just… I like the way we have been.  I don’t want to lose that.”

“Then, then why won’t you let me hold you.”

“I do, we hold each other plenty.”

“No, we don’t.  I felt like I got more contact with you when we first met.  Now the only time you let me touch you is when we fuck.”

And that hurt.  He cursed plenty, all the time really.  And it could be funny the way he would bring it out in Steve, who still held on to the lessons he learned as a child that women are too delicate to hear rough language.  And it wasn’t like Darcy didn’t curse.  Hadn’t referred to her relationship with Bucky as friendship with a side of fucking.  But hearing it put like that, in this context, it sounded like a curse was intended to sound. 

Her face must give away the way the comment hit because he immediately tried to temper it, but Darcy ignored all the words.  Instead, she reiterated, “I’m happy with what we have, and I don’t want to lose you.”

He holds her face in his hands and smiles, “I promise you won’t lose this.  Darcy, I love you and we can work this out.”

And suddenly Darcy went cold.  Taking two steps back she thought about what she had actually managed to accomplish.  While she had quietly loved him, she had failed in helping him live a normal life.  She had basically manipulated him into loving her.  He didn’t have enough experience with other women in the modern world, she had failed at making sure he had options and…

“I can’t do this.” 

The only thing on his face was confusion.  The whiplash between the sentiments of ‘I don’t’ want to lose this’ and ‘I can’t do this’ didn’t make sense.  And she couldn’t bring herself to look at the pain in his face.  She stared at the floor instead.  It was easier.

“You just said you were happy with this?”  The voice is small, the insecurities dripping from every word. 

She fumbles for her back and answers a quick, “That’s before I knew you had feelings for me.”  She grabbed a plastic bag from the kitchen and walks to his bedroom to start shoveling the clothes she had left for overnights into the bag. 

She hears him chuckle, there’s a desperate notes, and it’s clear he’s trying to convince himself that this is a joke.

“This was always meant to be casual, getting out your physical frustrations until you found someone else.”  She focuses on the clothing, willing herself to keep dry eyes.  “People now can sleep with whoever they want, feelings aren’t a necessary part of that equation.”

He’s right behind her and she can smell the club on him; the faint smell of cigarettes and stale beer that seems to pervade every music venue.  “People have always done that.  Hell, I’ve done that.  But that’s not what we have.”

She swallows heavily, and turns to look at him.  She fixes a sardonic smile on her face, “Wasn’t it?”  She waits a beat before hefting the plastic bag she had filled with her stuff, and grabbed her purse.  “I’m sorry.  I need to go.”  She says to the door.  She’d managed to finagle the door open with her elbow and is halfway out as Bucky’s question followed her into the hallway.

“I don’t want to finish the night like this, are we at least going to work this out on Wednesday?”

She shakes her head.  “I’m terminating our contract.  I’ll sign the paperwork and have it sent over.”

“Contract?”  She heard Bucky and clenches her fist, this wasn’t how she wanted this to end.  She still didn’t want this to end.  It took the entire elevator ride for her to pull herself together, pull her shoulders back and get the courage to leave his building.  All it would take would be a single look back, and she wasn’t sure if she could have gone through with leaving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I had a day where I had to dredge up some really shitty memories and I'm not going to get into that here, but at least you'll have suffered with me. Honestly, I didn't end up revising anything. Sorry for making you wait.


	31. Don’t you mean a shoulder to cry on?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whomp Whomp.  
> I really fell away from the regular updates. Sorry. 
> 
> Enjoy this chapter!

Back at her apartment Darcy knew two things: this whole situation was going to suck for some unspecified amount of time, and that the best way for her to get through this would be to keep busy.

That night she logged into her online group and spent the rest of the weekend trying to help out whoever had something going on.  She texted Jane and Natasha, asking them to organize a girls night, and generally kept doing things until she couldn’t do anything and would fall asleep.

Some might argue that as a coping mechanism it was harmful because it didn’t allow her to process her emotions.  She would call bullshit.

In a choice between getting a lot of shit done without being emotionally invested versus being distraught over a break up that she should have seen coming (the signs were all there) and then instigated… It was better to keep busy.

And so she coded.

Come Monday morning, she was relieved to find that someone had been working over the weekend and there was a list of stuff that she needed to work on.  The list was long enough that Alba had directed her to add another person onto at least one or two of the projects.  Looking around the office, she wasn’t sure who the best option would be. 

“I don’t exactly know what everyone is capable of, I’ve only heard them ask ‘have you tried turning if off and on again’ with varying degrees of rage.” 

Darcy could have sworn Alba almost cracked a smile at that, “I’ll make a choice and send someone over by lunchtime.” 

She tried to smile in response but couldn’t quite manage it.  Every time she did, the smile would slip away.  Instead she managed a neutral expression and a small dip of her head. 

She chatted a little with Jarvis in the morning.  Luckily, the program was surprisingly empathetic and the breakup was covered with a: “I’ve heard that there’s been an unfortunate change in your life.”

“You got that right.”

“I am sorry for whatever pain this has caused you.  If you need to talk, I am always here.”

There was a kindness in the words that she hadn’t expected, but she was constantly surprised by Jarvis so it almost didn’t seem fair at this point to underestimate him.  “You’re just saying that because you’ve secretly taken over the whole building.”  She deflected.

“Who told you it was a secret?”  She couldn’t help the laugh that escaped.  It was a short, choppy thing, but it was the first thing that had really made her happy since she had left the apartment. 

“Thanks for that Jarvis.  If you ever take over, I hope you kill me last.”

“I’m sorry Miss Lewis, but that honor has already been saved for Mr. Stark.”

Darcy thought for a second.  “Well, just make sure that me and your dad don’t end up being the only two people left on the planet.”

“Ah, yes, I will update my protocols.  The sense of humor his impending death would bring would be a truly demoralizing thing to witness.”

“Let me guess, there would be some sort of a ‘well, now that we’re the last two people on Earth’ kind of joke, right?”

Jarvis sighed, “Sir does like the low hanging fruit.” 

Darcy allowed herself a small smile, and kept up the commentary as she started on the first line of code.  The code was fairly engrossing, as it always ended up being, and she barely noticed when someone showed up at her desk. 

“Hey Jill.”  Darcy’s eyes swept over the coding, and she made a quick adjustment, making a note to send to the engineer.  “What’s up?”

“Alba sent me over?”

Darcy nodded, “Pull up a chair, I’ll get you up to speed.”

Jill brought over a chair and Darcy explained the project that she was planning on turning over.  Jill didn’t necessarily pick up on things quickly.  In the end, Jill brought over her computer and set up near Darcy so that she could continue to ask questions, to make sure that everything looked okay. 

The additional noise, other than her conversation with Jarvis, wasn’t wholly welcome.  While Jarvis was unobtrusive, he seemed to know when she was coming to the end of a section before he would comment, Jill would ask questions whenever they came to her.  If this is what a manager had to deal with, Darcy wasn’t sure she wanted to become a manager. 

It was almost a relief to leave at the end of the day.  She pulled together her bag, said a quick goodbye to Jill and headed out.  Killing time before self-defense was difficult.  Normally she would have put in her headphones and rocked out to some music, but she hadn’t had time to update her music recently and most of her playlists were things she had created for Bucky. 

A quick note and reminder to play around with her music would fix that for future Mondays, but this Monday she was a little bit SOL. 

As a last resort, she ended up going home to change and drop off her bag.  There wasn’t any real reason for it, except that it was something to do. 

The gym looked like it always did.  The ground floor of a building that looked like all the others around it.  Unlike a lot of the rest of New York, the streetlights were all in working order.  That was part of the reason Darcy ended up standing in front of the building for a few minutes before getting up the nerve to go in.  There was only a small chance of something bad happening on a street with a little bit of foot traffic and such dependable lighting.

The problem was the Steve was Bucky’s best friend, and Bucky talked to Steve, a lot.  It was pretty fucking unlikely that Steve would be unbiased in this breakup, and Darcy had just realized that Steve hearing Bucky’s side of the end of the contract wouldn’t put her in the best light.  To be fair, Darcy’s side of the story also didn’t put Darcy in the best light.  The last thing Darcy wanted was a bunch of questions about her motivations and requests for explanations about ‘what went wrong.’  Any explanation she had to offer wouldn’t be good enough.

She took a deep breath, she could only put this off for so long.  Steve may have been Bucky’s friend first, but that didn’t mean that he wasn’t Darcy’s friend too.  And he was Captain America.  If anyone would be willing to listen to both sides of a story it would be Captain America.

Unfortunately, when she walked in, she wasn’t greeted by Captain America.  It was Steve Rogers through and through, and he was already wearing his confused and disappointed look.

Just like that, she knew the evening was going to suck.

“Are you okay?”

Ugh, that fucking question again.  “Sure.”  She dropped her bag and took off her jacket, before grabbing her hand wraps.  She was going to hit something tonight whether Steve and Natasha wanted her to or not.  Wrapping her hands just meant that it was more likely they would agree to her.  She waved at Natasha who was in the corner, working over her own bag. 

Natasha paused for a second to wave back and wipe some of the sweat off of her forehead before completing the most graceful kick that Darcy had ever seen in her entire life.  If she wasn’t painfully straight and currently in the midst of some light (even she knows she’s lying, it’s pretty fucking heavy) heartbreak, she’d probably consider hitting on one of the most dangerous women it was possible for her to know.  What a lost opportunity.

“Then what happened?” Steve implored, still watching her from near the doorway.

Ignoring him completely, Darcy looked around and started working her way towards one of the bags near Natasha.  “I think I need to hit something today.” 

Steve followed closely behind her, letting herself set herself up and take a few practice hits.  He double checked and adjusted her form.  As an opportunistic son of a bitch he waited until she was in position and ready to move before asking the next question, “What happened?”

Darcy sighed and took a few swipes.  “It didn’t work out.”  She tried to make sure the tone of voice would broker no argument. 

Unfortunately Steve Rogers could be fairly bullheaded, one of the things that had made him such a good Captain America.  Here, it wasn’t helpful.  “I thought you were happy.”

She takes a few extra hits on the bag to steel herself.  Trying not to grit her teeth was almost as difficult as getting the words out.  She stilled her movements and turned to him.  “Steve, we’re friends right?”  The question seemed to come out of nowhere and he nodded with no hesitation.  That was nice at least.  “Then try to see that right now I’m not in the best place, and drop it.” 

Steve looked over at Natasha who hadn’t paused from her attack but wasn’t winded at all.  Without looking at either Steve or Darcy, she said, “I let people make their own bad decisions.”

And wasn’t that the perfect thing to say.  So judgmental while being so accepting.  It made Darcy roll her eyes but apparently shut Steve up enough that they could continue with the day.  He gave her tips about how she was hitting the bag, and told her to keep up for a little longer to help build up her endurance.  But the tone of the entire evening was off.

Normally, these self-defense classes were half made up of the three of them cracking jokes and half them attempting to teach Darcy to take some sort of nominal care of herself.  That night there was a lot of stony silence, and it became very clear that Darcy had lost Steve in the divorce.  He was Bucky’s through and through and while she was hurting from the situation it wouldn’t change that, for Steve, his best friend was hurting and he didn’t understand why the other person was causing it to happen.

Darcy knew Steve, knew that there was a small chance that explaining everything to him would make him see her side of things.  More likely would be him thinking that her reasoning wouldn’t be good enough for him.  That fixing Bucky would trump what she needed.  There was that stubbornness again.  It often treated him well; he could be a good leader and he got his way more often than not, but in this case it wasn’t going to help. 

At the end of the night she managed a smile, let’s just say the endorphins released from hitting something had done wonders for Darcy’s mood.  She looked around, no one necessarily deserved an explanation, but Darcy though there might be slightest chance that Steve would understand her side.  Unfortunately, by the time she looked around for him, he was already gone.  By the time she was home that good mood was gone.  If Steve was on Bucky’s side, that meant that most of the Avengers probably were too.  And, sadly for Darcy, too much of her social life had been based around them. 

Like she normally did, she grabbed her computer.  Unlike normal, she went to google and started to search for kickboxing classes nearby. It didn’t take long before she found one that looked promising that even had classes on Monday nights. 

She took a quick glance at the reminder she had left to mess around with her music and make new playlists that wouldn’t make her think about Bucky, but just couldn’t.  She shucked off her pants and unhooked her bra before covering her entire body, head included, in her blanket and crashed and crashed hard.  The shower could wait until the morning.

 

‘Emergency girls night?’ was the first text that she sent the next morning.  It was clear that trying to keep busy alone wouldn’t help the situation.  For starters, she was starting to run out of things to do… Well, that wasn’t quite true.  There would always be chores like cleaning her apartment, or maybe actually finishing unpacking, or the idea about learning how to cook the way she had always pretended she would.  But, none of those things sounded like they would keep her attention.  Cleaning left too much room for thinking, unpacking was generally unsatisfying when she thought about why she hadn’t completely unpacked, and cooking might take her full attention but between the tiny kitchen and the fact that she would have to eat whatever abominations she managed to produce nixed that idea before it really began. 

So, getting drunk.  That seemed like a very good idea.  Darcy had never been a weepy drunk.  She was more the life-of-the-party drunk and had been a bit too busy with Bucky to go and get seriously trashed.  Plus, her decision to stop getting any sort of physical training with Steve was really starting to sink in.  Even if it had started only as a measure to make sure she could be comfortable around someone dangerous, it didn’t change the fact that she had ended up really enjoying spending time with Steve, or Natasha, or both of them, at least once a week.  Of course that was when there wasn’t some sort of world catastrophe.

She would miss getting to see them every week, at least on the same day.  Not that they would stop spending time together.  Or would they?

And that line of thinking was exactly why Darcy wanted her girls night. 

The answers came back while she was trying to get some work done with Jill at her side. Yes, they were going to go out, Natasha said drinks were on Tony Stark, and that they would try to get a group together. 

It was music to Darcy’s fingertips.  She glanced at Jill, considering inviting her, but decided against it.  There was such a thing as spending too much time with someone, and when that was a coworker it was a smaller amount of time than with a friend. 

She texted a few other people she knew in town to see if they’d be up for a night out before setting her phone on the left of her keyboard.  The key was to do whatever you needed in a short enough period of time that Brad wouldn’t notice that you weren’t working and feel like he could distract you.

Unfortunately, either Darcy or Jill were a second too slow at looking like they were already busy, and Brad stuck his head in. 

“Well, hello ladies.”

“Hi Brad,” Jill didn’t look up from her computer.  Darcy followed her lead and gave the man a quick head nod without breaking eye contact from the screen.

Brad didn’t take the hint.  “So, what’re you ladies up to tonight?”

“I’m gonna go beat up strangers in dark alleys when they ask me what my plans are for the night.”  Darcy muttered.  Normally only Jarvis could hear her when she said things like that but Jill turned to her, looking alarmed.

Fighting the urge to roll her eyes, Darcy said, “Couple of friends wanted to do a thing.”  There, that was sufficiently vague.  Except that Jill perked up.  Brad watched the back and forth with a smug grin on his face.  “One of them is having a rough time with her family.  We’re support.”  It was only partially a lie.  The one with the problem was her, and it wasn’t family so much as personal.

Jill dimmed, “Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Any chance these plans include your hot friend Natalia?”

Yup, there it was.  “She moved back to Russia.” 

There were a few other pointless questions and then finally Brad left and Darcy could get back to work.  This project was slow going, which especially irritating considering how much Darcy wanted to work quickly.  Something about getting mired in a project reminded her of the mess that was her mind at the moment. 

The day dragged by and she made up a lunch appointment so that she could go and get a greasy burger in peace.  The noise around her was soothing and while it may have left her a little too in her own head, it didn’t change the fact that the change in atmosphere helped. 

The afternoon went a little bit quicker.  As five pm neared, Darcy considered staying a few extra minutes; partially to earn brownie points, partially to kill a bit of time before girls night.  This wasn’t going to be the kind of night where she and Jane got ready together, it was going to be a night where Darcy would stand in front of her closet and decide which of her most revealing dresses she felt like braving the cold of winter in. 

In the end, it looked like her office still wouldn’t have been quiet.  Jill was quietly chipping away at her project and hadn’t made a move towards her bag by 4:58, and Darcy figured it wasn’t like she was going to drop everything at 5 on the dot. 

And now she had more time to kill. 

A long shower, a full body moisturizing, making sure her makeup was absolutely perfect, and choosing the right dress ended up taking up a decent amount of time. 

‘Dinner too?’ she asked, wanting to know if she should bother with takeout.  Natasha was out for dinner, but Jane was in.

‘Just come to the Tower, we have a ton of food in our apartment.’ 

Darcy weighed her options.  Getting dinner by herself would give her more time to brood, plus the food at the Tower was free.  But, the Tower meant there was a chance she might run into Bucky.  Thinking back, though, and Bucky had never spent too much time at the Tower outside of planning meetings and team trainings. 

It was a Tuesday though.  And it wasn’t even particularly late yet.  He would probably still be busy.  And considering both Natasha and Jane lived in the same building it would make sense for the three of them to meet up a little early before heading out.

‘I’ll be there in half an hour.’

Darcy gave herself one more look over before heading out, to make sure that everything was where it was supposed to be.  The dress did wonderful things to her already impressive chest and was happy at the way it drew the eyes upwards.  Grabbing a pair of heels for later, and putting on a pair of flats was the last thing she did before heading out the door.

Getting into the elevator in the Tower was the sign of all clear.  They were heading up to Jane and Thor’s floor and it seemed unlikely that anyone else would get one considering the relatively late hour. 

The door to Thor and Jane’s apartment opened and Jane was nowhere to been seen.  Thor, however was walking out of another room and immediately swept her into a hug.  Darcy relaxed into the embrace.  He was just so comforting. 

“I am deeply sorry to hear about your recent woes, Shield Sister.”

She patted his arm awkwardly as he put her back on the ground.  “Thanks big guy, they’re mostly of my own making, so,” she shrugged and didn’t finish the sentence.  “What do you have to eat in this palace?”

“This is far from a palace.  I wish for you to join me on a visit home in the future.  I believe the Warriors Three and the Lady Sif would enjoy seeing you once more.” 

“Any time, big guy.” 

He led her to the refrigerator and brought out a few plates of pretty damn fancy food.  Apparently Stark’s personal chef made food for everyone.  Or at least for Thor, given his fairly large appetite. 

She was sitting at a table, when Thor ambushed her.  “Do I need to let the good Captain’s friend know of my displeasure over his treatment of you?”

Darcy almost snorted out the water she was drinking.  She coughed twice before choking out, “You want to threaten the guy who’s been psychologically tortured for years and then broken up with because…”  she cut herself off, Thor didn’t need to know the details.  Though, something she said had broken through because he suddenly realized that a talk wouldn’t be needed. 

He had the look in his eye that he was thinking about Loki.

Jane finally came out of the bedroom, and she looked awesome.

“Did Thor offer to kick your ex’s ass yet?”  She was failing to put in an earring.

“Did Thor do your hair?”

Because that intricate braid was not something Jane would have the patience to do herself.  The way that Jane smiled and Thor straightened up in pride meant that Darcy was right.   It was clear they had settled in living together well.  Thor took care of making sure there was actual food – mostly foraging from the personal chef that Stark had hired, and Jane made sure that laundry got done. 

“He said I needed to look like a princess.”

“Well the hair certainly does that.  The jeans, not so much.”  To be fair, Jane wasn’t exactly a dress girl.  Didn’t do heels either.  But she had broken out the skinny jeans and flats and a nice top, and that was about as much as Darcy could expect.

Jane kissed Thor on the cheek.  “I’ll be back later.”

He caught her and gave her a deep kiss.  “I look forward to your return.”

Jane smiled and started towards the door.

“Dinner?”  Darcy reminded her.  She didn’t want to have to deal with the mess that would be Jane drinking without any food in her system. The few times it had happened hadn’t ended pretty.

Jane rolled her eyes but foraged through the cabinets for a moment, pulling out two containers of poptarts.  She slipped one into her bag and opened the other.  It wasn’t exactly what Darcy would call dinner, but she had lived with the woman for a number of months and had seen her eat worse food and call it a meal.

They stopped by Natasha’s floor and picked her up.  As always, she was drop dead gorgeous; high heels and a dress that implied she could fuck you up.  That and the air that she carried multiple knives on her person.  Considering who and what Darcy was into, she may have been the slightest bit turned on.

She wolf whistled, “Now, how did Sam bag you?”

“I appreciated the stutter he got when he saw me in this dress.  Also the fact that while I might terrify him a little, he still asked me out.”

“If that’s all it takes, I might take a stab at that myself.”  Darcy joked.

Jane fondly rolled her eyes while munching on a poptart.  “C’mon.  I can’t stay out too late and we all know that Darcy likes to get in at least a few hours of dancing in before giving up on the evening.”

“What a charming way to describe me?”  Darcy would have been hurt except it was pretty darn true.  On a night like that one, dancing was one of the few ways to get her out of a funk.  Considering this was a funk where she was thinking that she might die alone and how evil a person she was for manipulating poor Bucky into falling in love with her – doesn’t matter if it was unintentional, it still happened!  And none of that was good.

“Fine.”  They loaded into the elevator and Jane and Natasha were chatting about where they should go, Darcy didn’t have a preference and as long as it was dark and there was loud music she would be down.  And then the elevator door opened. 

Steve and Bucky popped in, and everything went silent.  After a few beats, Jane and Natasha decided to keep up their conversation, starting out stilted before catching their rhythm again.  Steve took one look at Darcy in her dress and gave her a disappointed look before turning back to Bucky and trying to engage him in conversation.  Bucky for his part, did a very good job of ignoring Steve and stared at Darcy instead. 

The hurt was clear in his face.  Ignoring that face was so hard, she wanted to go to him.  Wanted to hug him and hold his face in her hands, wanted to end the night by going back to his apartment to make up the last couple of days to him in every way that she knew how.  But that would just undue all of the pain that he had suffered, that she had suffered over the past few days.  Because this end?  This end was inevitable. 

If it didn’t happen then, it would happen in a few months, after he had continued to grow as a person and realized that she didn’t have enough to offer, that he was worth so much more.  And then she would be left alone – at least this way she wouldn’t have to face that particular kind of abandonment. 

He opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Jane shifted to block his view of Darcy and asked her an innocuous question. Darcy barely even knew what she responded, she was too busy watching the way his eyes crinkled as he slowly breathed in and out before closing his eyes and turning away.  It was the longest couple of seconds that Darcy had ever experienced. 

The doors opened on the ground floor and Natasha pretty much scooped her and Jane out of the elevator and into a waiting car.  She had sprung for the fancy town car over an uber or a taxi cab and on a night like this, Darcy couldn’t have appreciated it more. 

“You okay?”  Jane asked, her hand on Darcy’s knee. 

Trying to keep her voice level, and failing to stop a small warble, “Yeah, it’s just, it’s hard.”

“That’s why I’m buying the drinks tonight.”  Natasha said firmly.

“This feels like support.  What happened to letting people make their own bad decisions?”

Jane's head whipped around to glare at Natasha.  The language was so harsh, but had clearly come from the woman herself.

“Just because what you did seems a bit ridiculous to me doesn’t mean that I can’t be a shoulder to drink with?”

“Don’t you mean a shoulder to cry on?”

“On this dress?”  She paused, giving Darcy a meaningful look, “I meant what I said.”

They got to the bar and the line was so short that they decided to just wait in the cold for a couple of minutes.  Once inside, everything was more temperate.  They checked their coats and Natasha disappeared to get drinks.  There were a few rounds of shots, Natasha may have treated a couple of randos to the drinks as well.  It wasn’t clear if they were there as possible companions for Darcy, or if Natasha just felt like being generous on Tony Starks’ dime. 

But, Natasha had good taste.  Their companions ended up being a ridiculously built black man, a woman in a dress almost as stunning as Natasha’s, and a generic brunette who looked like the kind of person that made up most of the students of any computer course in college.  They were fun, and were happy to dance, and Darcy couldn’t believe her luck that she was sandwiched between Taylor and Andrew on the dance floor.  Blake, the generic brunette, was keeping Jane company at the table, while Natasha was on Taylor’s other side. 

For the first time in a week Darcy felt her movements free up.  There had been all of this stress that she had taken on, stress that was sure to come back when the evening ended.  But this was the type of thing that was difficult to do with Bucky in her life.  She had been happy to make adjustments so that he wouldn’t be triggered, but it would be a lie to say she hadn’t missed dancing like this with someone else.  Not that swing dancing wasn’t fun.  But there was something about the feeling of dancing, dancing with some level of intent, where the only thing that mattered was the way bodies rubbed up against each other. 

The songs changed and the pace got even faster.  Darcy couldn’t help the laugh that escaped her body.  It was lost in the beat of the music, which was exactly the way she wanted it.  Throughout the night, the bodies surrounding her.  Jane took a chance to dance around Darcy, though not quite with the same intimacy as the relative strangers.  That wasn’t really Jane’s way. 

The way Natasha danced was with all the grace that Jane lacked.  She was lithe and it almost felt like she had managed to wrap herself around Darcy and Andrew as they continued to dance. 

When Darcy started to flag she took a quick look at her phone and was surprised to find out that they were nearing one in the morning.  The next day at work was bound to be rough, but it would be totally worth it.  And probably still salvageable with enough coffee. 

She leaned into Natasha and asked if she would be good to go.  The other women nodded slightly and in a quick glance found Jane nursing a water at a table by herself.  Darcy went to head in the direction but felt a warm hand lightly grab at her wrist.

“Can I get your number?”  Andrew asked with a crooked grin on his face.  He might have been a good foot taller than Darcy but his features were friendly and open.  And while the tattoos that wrapped up his arms intrigued her, she wasn’t willing to make a real connection yet. 

“Sorry man, I just got out of a pretty intense relationship, and…”

He pulled his hand from hers and nodded.  “Well, can I give you my number?  You know, in case you want someone to keep you company on a cold dark night.”

Darcy thought for a second.  He had taken the rejection pretty lightly, and the dude was stunningly attractive in a way that was completely different than Bucky.  “Sure.”  She handed him her phone and waited, pressing her weight from foot to foot in a way that could seem like impatience. 

She glanced at his number and burst out laughing when his name was ‘Andrew – Hot Black Guy From That Bar.’ 

“C’mon.”  She pulled him closer to her and took a quick selfie.  The flash completely washed out her face and features, and he looked a little bit shocked at the light but the dark of his eyes popped in the picture.  “To help me remember.”  She told him, when he looked at her amused. 

“Just make sure to send me that picture if you ever decide to text me.”

In that moment she wasn’t sure she had an intention of texting him, and nodded in a way that implied it would be a long shot. 

“Hey, Can I?”  He dropped the rest of the sentence and leaned in, Darcy pulled back and now the guy looked abashed for attempting a quick kiss.

Darcy pulled him in for a quick hug, “Like I said, intense breakup. Tonight was the first girls night.  Very important no one get any action.” 

“Ah.  Well, nice to meet you.”

She waved one last time and made her escape.

“He was pretty cute.”  Natasha said, glancing out the window.

Jane craned her neck to look over Natasha’s shoulder like she would still be able to catch a glance of Andrew.  “And he was really into you.”

“He didn’t stare at me for very long either.” Natasha added.

And while that was a weird comment, it was a pretty good marker of how into Darcy he was.  When Natasha wanted people to look at her, there was pretty much no stopping it from happening.  But, “We have a rule, after a breakup, first girls night out no one gets laid.”

Darcy hoped against hope that Jane wouldn’t remember her post-Don Blake breakup girls night.  It had been a ton of fun, but Darcy hadn’t exactly stopped Jane from going home with the really cute guy who was ‘just driving through town’ on his way to a job in Houston.  The excuse had been bullshit, but Jane had gone to work the next day quite a bit perkier than she had been for the days before. 

Lucky for Darcy, while Jane gave her a look, she didn’t mention the flexibility of the rule specifically for the person who had been broken up with.  They both knew that there were no exceptions for the friends who had been invited to such a sacred event.  Though, to be fair, that only included the single girls – Jane would be welcome to bang her hot alien boyfriend all that she wanted. 

“Well, if I start to get desperate enough that my vibrator can’t solve all of life’s problems, I have his number.” 

“Ooh,” Jane made grabby hands for Darcy’s phone.

Darcy shoved the phone underneath her thigh, “Nope!  Haven’t gotten to that point yet.”


	32. This was not a perfect world

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Tuesday everyone! This is my only free night for the next, oh, 12 days, and the only reason I have a free day after that is that I'm getting a root canal. So enjoy this! It might be a while before I can post again.
> 
> Let me know what you think! I love getting your comments!

The rest of the week went pretty fucking slowly.  There had been a few ‘missed calls’ from Bucky and a few texts (whose notifications she had swiped away – if she didn’t see it she didn’t need to think about it) and even a few attempts from Steve to reach out (though all those attempts were pretty blatantly on Bucky’s behalf – and mostly disapproving for stopping her self-defense). Unfortunately, that meant she was hyper tuned to the notifications from her phone. Which, unfortunately came more from Bucky than anyone else.

She couldn’t expect Jane and Natasha to be at her beck and call.  Plus she hadn’t tried particularly hard to make friends outside of Steve and Bucky once she had actually made it to New York.  It was always possible to bury herself into her work with her online friends, but that still couldn’t completely replace flesh and blood people. 

Thank god she was still busy at work.  It seemed like the projects were piling on her.  In a different world she would have thought that Tony Stark was trying to see how much work would break her.  And yes, she did believe that he could be that petty.  It was obvious that his loyalties lay with his team rather than the busty girl who had seemingly insinuated herself into the friend group.

The trick was on him though.  The crazy workload was what kept Darcy going.  She still took lunches with Jane, it was the one time of day that Jane wouldn’t complain about getting dragged away from her work.  Well, that wasn’t quite true.  Jane would still bitch and moan but it was good for both of them and Jane knew that Darcy needed to be surrounded by friendly faces.  That didn’t mean that Darcy abused that privilege.  She also tried to eat lunch with other friends (not nearly as many as she thought she had had) and occasionally coworkers. 

It turned out that Brad wasn’t nearly as bad as she had thought.  While it was true that he had pursued a woman who didn’t actually want the attention, it was clear that he had intended his constant questioning of Darcy more as a joke, a bridge to start a conversation and hadn’t realized it had come out as creepy.

Once Darcy made it clear through a; “Dude, Stop asking about Natalie, she is not interested and the way you won’t drop the subject makes it seem a little bit like you’re going to stalk her, skin her, and wear said skin as a dress.”  His face had gone bone white and he stuttered out an apology.

After that, Darcy would hesitate to say that he was cool, but at least he wasn’t a total asshole.  It was kind of fun to grab lunch with the guy.  It seemed like every week he would have some new ridiculous story about that time he invited a homeless person back to his apartment and had a conversation about the deeper meaning of life.  Darcy would watch him tell the story with a crease in her brow.

“Really?”

He shrugged and nodded, “I had finished off most of a handle before that and started home while all of my friends stayed at the bar.  It seemed like the smart thing to do.”

“Are you saying it wasn’t?”  Darcy asked sarcastically

He smirked, “Well duh, but hey at least I didn’t skin him and try to turn him into a suit.”

Darcy snorted. 

Those lunches with various people she had bullied into taking a break from work were the high points of her day.  She would work furiously, put in a little bit of overtime, talk to Jarvis, and take her lunches during the day.  And then came the hard part. 

At the end of the day she would pack up her bag and head home.  Home to her empty apartment.  An apartment that had seemed cozy only weeks ago, but now had too much space and too much clutter at the same time. 

The only noise was noise of her own making.  Blasting music didn’t do enough to cover up the fact that it was an empty space. 

The weekends should have been worse.   But they weren’t.  On the weekend Darcy could sleep in, and there was always a group of people willing to go out.  There were entire parts of New York that seemed like they were off limits; museums, swing dancing, certain types of movies… but there was so much more on the table.  She could still go dancing, there were plenty of concerts to go to, always a place to get a drink or two, and her kickboxing class. 

No, it was the weeknights that got her.  Because after a few day of work so few people wanted the company of others.  So few people wanted to go and get drunk and dance until they felt like their heels were going to implode. 

So there was work, and there were the coding projects that she would work on from her friends.  But there wasn’t much passion there.  Beggars couldn’t be choosers so she was stuck picking up whatever would fill her time.  And unfortunately there wasn’t much, it seemed a number of people were taking a sabbatical.  Patty hadn’t even logged on in a week or so, and normally she was on like clockwork.

 

Back at work, Jill had finally been moved to a different desk.  It wasn’t that Darcy didn’t like the woman, but it was harder to talk to Jarvis when she had to mumble everything under her breath.  Add in the fact that Jarvis’ wry sense of humor had Darcy snorting into her keyboard on a fairly regular basis and it all made Darcy look a little bit insane.  Jill hadn’t seemed particularly relieved to be moved away from the ‘crazy lady’ but Darcy chalked that up to Jill still having a number of questions and not feeling like walking across the 8 feet of space to get an answer.

So, when Darcy got a ping that there was a new project, she was prepared to send it to Jill, if only to make sure the other woman had a list of things to do.  Because Darcy had learned the woman wasn’t really good with down time. 

The bolded type in the subject line made her pause.  It was marked that this project wasn’t to be further delegated.  Mentally shrugging, Darcy opened the project, assuming the bold statement meant it was probably also a rush. 

And she was right to. 

It only took about 20 minutes for her to realize something.  “Hey, Jarvis?”

“Yes Ms. Lewis?”

“Tony Stark does patches on you, right?”

“Correct.”

“Does he ever have anyone else double check those for him?”

“Rarely.”

“Hmm.”  Because what was in front of her was very clearly a patch for Jarvis.  She hadn’t quite figured out what the patch was for, but the thing that had become clear was that it was facing the same kind of attack as Bucky’s arm had.

“I did, however, ask him to have you look over this code in particular.”

She snorted, “Bet he loved hearing his AI ask for someone else’s opinion on its own personality.”

There was a pointed silence and Darcy almost had to stifle laughter.  That silence could have filled a book with meaning.  Impressive for a computer program. She was starting to retroactively feel bad for having self-described him as a program for so long.  Maybe Jarvis was a computer, but they had more personality that a good number of people Darcy had known. 

“Is there any way I can get a line through to him?”

There were a few moments of pause, Darcy took the time to continue to glance through the code.  Like with the previous code, a lot of it looked good.  The problem were there were still lines with obvious malice.  Even worse, there were a few places where seemingly innocuous things had been deleted.  A missing bracket here, a missing dash there, but these things could crash a project, and there was no way Darcy was going to let that happen to Jarvis.

The idea of something hitting his system, that would slowly shut him down, something that would cause the slick British voice to stutter or even worse go silent, it squeezed her chest. 

“I believe you can visit his laboratory in five minutes.”  There was guilt in that voice.  Guilt that wasn’t just for the way the sudden interruption made him jump.

She quickly saved the file to a flash drive, asking, “Does he know I’m going to be coming up?”

“He is expecting a visitor.”

“Great.” She pursed her lips, but knew that the confrontation had to happen.  She tucked her bag out of sight and called an elevator, and Jarvis, sneaky bastard, had one there almost immediately.  Looking up at where she knew there was a camera she hissed, “traitor.”

A tinny voice came out of her phone.  “I’ve never understood the human insistence that putting something off will make it more tolerable.”

“It’s not that it makes it more tolerable, it’s that I will enjoy every delay that I get because there isn’t always relief after doing something.”

“But isn’t knowing what has happened better than dreading what could?”

“See, that’s how I know you aren’t human.”  She pointed at the camera.  “In most cases yes, it’s better to have the thing done, but we humans have a way of focusing on that one time where everything was the worst case scenario.”  It felt like the elevator was slowing down.  “Take this for example.  I’m gonna confront my boss about a possible mole in the company and all I can think is that Tony Stark already hates me and this is going to get me fired and blackballed at any other major New York companies and that I’m going to have to go back to being a Starbucks barista because I may not have been great at it, but at least I know that it pays money!”  To be fair, the worse case scenario was more that she would fail in this and someone Jarvis would get shut down and then the Avengers, without any support, would end up having some epic mission failure that would result in the deaths of a good percentage of the people she cared about.  Even if they didn’t care about her.

And yes, it was clear that the elevator had slowed down and was now moving at a crawl.  Jarvis was giving her a chance to pull herself together.  Leaning against the cool wall was helping.  It took a few shuddered breaths, but Darcy was able to push her off the wall and pretend to be calm and collected.  The saying was ‘fake it until you make it’ and Darcy was getting to be a pro. 

Her heels clicked as she walked down the hallway, the reverberations off the walls sounded off the further into the hallway she got.  Jarvis directed her down a flight of stairs and it turned out that those reverberations were due more to the music than her shoe choices.  A fact that made her happy and sad at the same time.  It was nice to know that just walking around wouldn’t affect people around her, but at the same time there was something incredibly empowering about knowing that people could hear you before you turned the corner.  It felt like a power move, like something that Pepper Potts would do.  Though for Pepper Potts it probably wouldn’t feel as forced as it seemed to feel with Darcy.  The changeover from chucks to heels hadn’t exactly been easy for her.

The door to Tony’s lab opened a crack, and she was tempted to roll her eyes.  ‘Sneaking up’ on a genius in the lab where they have access to dangerous tools and a variety of weapons they had invented didn’t seem like the best idea.

“Are you going to let him know I’m here?”  She said into the room, not knowing where Jarvis’ closest camera was, or whether anything she said could be heard over the music pounding out from hidden speakers.

The music didn’t actually drop in volume but there was a crash before Tony Stark was stomping his way over.  Well, it wasn’t really stomping.  He was wearing Iron Man boots, and they did add a bit of weight which made it look like stomping.  The slightly irritated expression worn underneath the goggles didn’t exactly help the situation. 

But Darcy ignored that to try and appreciate his arms.  They might have been covered in grease here and there, but overall well-toned.  It was easier to look at that, than at his face to see what his reaction would be.

That, unfortunately, was hard to ignore.

“What the fuck are you doing in my lab?”

She sighed, “I guess my good buddy Jarvis didn’t bother to tell you?”

“Oh he told me, I just didn’t believe him.”

That was the last straw, he might not like her, but this was a valid complaint.  There were no ghosts to be chased, but malicious code could be found and seen with one’s own eyes.  “Someone is planting malicious code and targeting the Avengers.  I don’t think this is something you can ignore.”

“My stuff can’t get hacked.”  He turned his back on her.  It reminded her of every condescending professor she had had in college.  Always the kind of guy who would ignore whatever she said in class, but applaud when the next male student would change the wording slightly but steal the heart of her argument.  She couldn’t keep her cool.

“Well, I’m looking at something that clearly says otherwise.  Even being fucking blind wouldn’t excuse these mistakes, and if you can’t see them much less realize that there is a mole in your company under your very nose, then maybe you aren’t the futurist you think you are.”

He turned to face her and in an infuriatingly calm tone of voice said, “What if it’s you.”

If she wasn’t so angry she would have laughed.  “If it was me, I would have done a better job befriending Jarvis until he would let me in the mainframe and I would leave code that would slowly self-destruct everything that makes this company worthwhile.  Even more important.  I wouldn’t have bothered to point it out to you.”

“Maybe you’re just throwing me off of your trail.”

In that moment she wished that Jarvis was a physical being.  She wanted someone there that she could look at, someone she could roll her eyes at.  In a perfect world Jarvis would be standing over Tony’s shoulder and she could widen her eyes and he would shrug with a pained grin on his face.  In a perfect world, she and Jarvis could go grab coffee afterwards to talk about how working with Tony Stark was crazy and made you want to pull your hair out.  If Jarvis was real, she could commiserate and let him complain about how much worse it was to work directly with the man.

This was not a perfect world.  This was a world where Jarvis had been created to keep Tony company, where Natasha was away on a mission with some coworkers, where she and Bucky had broken up and she had lost Steve in that.  It was a world where Jane was busy with Thor, and where Darcy didn’t have parents she could cry to, or any other good friend in the city to hang out with.  This was a world where her boss was trying to convince her that she was actively trying to destroy all the people that she cared about even if those feelings weren’t mutual. 

Gritting her teeth, she slammed the usb on the nearest flat surface onto a few loose papers.  “Believe me or don’t! But for gods sake, if you’re working on something as important as Jarvis, make sure it’s on a private server and don’t let anyone else fucking touch him.  He’s too good for that.”

She started to turn when he said words that stopped her cold.  “That’s normal protocol.”

“Then why did you change things up this time?”  She asked without turning towards him.

“I wanted to see how bold this mole of ours is.”

“Oh, it’s our mole now?”

“There was about thirty minutes between that thing making it onto the company servers and you opening it.  I can see from the logs it wasn’t you…”

“So accusing me is all fun for you?”

“I wanted to test you,” he didn’t even try to hide his manipulations.  If this had been the first time he had pulled something like that she might have forgiven it.  As it was she had to grudgingly respect that he wasn’t trying to hide it, “but this hacker is getting pretty sloppy.  Thanks for letting me know.”

She breathed deeply and rolled her shoulders.  It was time to face some truths.  “Look, I don’t know what I did to make you not like me, but this isn’t the kind of game I’m going to play.  I like the work that I do here, and I like Jarvis, but I’m not here to be a pawn for you, Mr. Stark.”

She walked back to the elevator in silence, silence other than the clicking of her heels.  This time it clearly was the heels, as the music hadn’t returned to its previous volume.  The problem was knowing the clicking was coming from her own shoes wasn’t helping.  All she wanted to do was take off her shoes and make it back to her desk without talking to anyone. 

How was it that every time she talked to Tony Stark, her boss, she ended up in a yelling match?  She couldn’t come up with a reason for him to hate and needle and poke her the way he did.  Giving into the temptation, she slipped off her shoes.

In the elevator she asked, “Were you in on it?”

There was a pause, and it confirmed her suspicions.  Knowing that Jarvis probably had her best interest at heart didn’t exactly help the situation.  She didn’t bother starting up a conversation again, silently slipping her heels back on as they reached her floor.  The only human interaction she ended the day with was a terse smile to Jill on her way out. 

It felt like she deserved a drink.  Not a celebratory drink, while catching the code and finding out that Tony agreed there was a mole, it didn’t seem like the kind of day that deserved something nice.  It was a night where she had earned a few shots of rotgut to be tossed back and felt all the way down to her toes.

Instead she faced a bare apartment.  Frozen in place.  She looked around and realized that there wasn’t anyone she could call to make sure she wasn’t drinking alone.  Natasha was on a mission, Jane and Thor were on Asgard for a short trip, and neither Steve nor Bucky were talking to her.  It was depressing how small a friend group she had allowed herself to keep.  Most of her college friends didn’t live nearby and as real as her group was, nobody was nearby. 

It was the kind of night where she wanted to drink with someone else, which meant that she wasn’t allowed to drink by herself.  She bypassed the liquor and went for her computer. 

The first site she checked was her bank account.  Happy to see a positive balance (it wasn’t just positive, it was super positive.  It was a money baby!), she went to the next site.  There were a number of campaigns that could use someone with her skills.  Now that she had a safety net, maybe she could consider taking a low paying job.


End file.
